Tails' Pokémon Adventure
by chuboy
Summary: An approved redo of the popular Tails' Pokémon Adventure by TilasFox. Mostly changed, unfinished. Tails is warped by mysterious science to the Pokémon world! How does he cope, and what is happening to him?
1. The Fight

**DISCLAIMER: 'Redo of Tails' Pokémon Adventure' (or whatever other names it may go by) is ©opyright 2004 to 2007 chuboy. It is hosted on ****Fan Fiction . net (hereby known as FF) ****free of charge and under no circumstances should any additional fee be required to view this material. 'Redo of Tails' Pokémon Adventure' is the sole property of myself, and of FF at any time when it is hosted on their server. This text has been reviewed and has been rated 'M'. Neither FF nor myself can be held responsible for any terms, ideas, phrases or otherwise that you may encounter within this work that you find to be offensive (to the greatest extent permissible by the rules governing the hosting of this text). Although you may quote lines from the text in an independent review you may not publish the work anywhere else on the internet. If you see this story published anywhere on the internet other than FF servers you agree to tell me straight away using the review function or private message function. Printing this document is most welcome but do not sell it. By reading any further than the line rule below you agree to the above. Any constructive criticism is welcome, in fact I appreciate a poor review that's backed up with decent reasons far more than I do seeing "zOMG d1s iz d bezt stori evar bcuz tailz is teh coolne55!!!!one".**

Basically… read it, enjoy it, print it if you really want, REVIEW it. **DO NOT plagiarise it or you will burn in Hell!**

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"Look, I do not believe this, Tails! Three times you screwed up – THIS WEEK! What have you got to say for yourself?" raged an angered Sally.

"I-I-I was j-just trying to help," stammered Tails, who was cowering in his chair.

"Yeah, lighten up on him, Sal, he's just a kid. Hey, everyone makes mistakes: that's why they put backspace keys on keyboards and erasers on pencils." reasoned Sonic, trying to soften the blow on his best friend.

"L-LIGHTEN UP!? Let's go through everything he did this week that he wasn't asked to do, shall we? Minor to major: Right, on Monday, remember? We were collecting power rings and Tails was the gopher on that day. So we told him _explicitly_ what to do – get chilidogs for lunch, the lot hold onion, right? He gets back twenty minutes late, with 300 Mobians worth of chilidogs, all onion and nothing extra! Somehow his brain managed to completely invert the whole order before he even got to the fast food store!"

Tails watched helplessly as Sally continued raving.

"So we forgave him that time, because everyone makes mistakes. But two days later – again!" she continued. "Tails, can you make Amy and me a coffee, please?" Sally mimicked Sonic, ""Sure, Sonic. Be back in a minute." Does Tails even know how to make coffee? No. Did he try? Unfortunately, yes. Did he try and fix the problem? Yes, God help us all. The freaking' idiot turns around, trips over a stray toolbox, burns Amy, Sonic and me, before setting off a chaotic scene of havoc inside his own garage! You should be thankful that Shadow and Knux were around to help douse the flames, Tails! Unfortunately, those priceless and important plans for the next Eggman espionage missions for the REST OF THIS YEAR were burned to dust!"

At this point, Tails was fighting back tears of anger and sadness. Why was Sally so mean? He only wanted to help, and this is the thanks he gets?

"Sally, Tails is eight freaking years old! Sure, he's smart, but I bet you made mistakes like that four years ago! Oh, sorry, you _never_ make mistakes." Sonic shot the insult at her.

"Yeah, well at least I'm not a conceited, aquaphobic hedgehog whose only abilities are to eat and run fast!" Sally retorted.

"Since when have you gone for a swim recently?"

"That doesn't matter; my point is you should–"

Tails couldn't stand it any longer. He flew out of his seat and turned to face Sally.

"Yeah, well at least I'm not a filthy slut who enjoys chatting up other species for the fun of watching them fall for you!" he yelled at Sally.

The outburst brought total and instant silence. Sure, Sonic had heard Tails say "crap" if he was _really_ annoyed, but heck! Sonic doubted Tails would've ever said those words. Sonic had doubted Tails even knew them.

"Tails, I hope you realize that I can make a cup of coffee, remember an order, and walk through a garage without causing destructive chaos." Sally replied calmly.

"Accidents happen…" Tails blushed slightly, still angry.

"For example, you?" Sally retorted.

"What are you saying?" Tails said, his breath quickening.

"You were an accident. Not planned. A defect, or should I say, side effect. Your parents didn't even bother giving you a decent name! Miles Prower. What are you, a speed limit?" Sally gave a cold laugh.

Tails couldn't believe it. No one called him by his real name for that exact reason. He hated it.

"I was not a side-effect, you cross-breeding disgrace to society!" Tails screamed, moving in to headbutt her straight in the gut.

"Tails, NO!" Sonic yelled, unleashing a spin attack to divert Tails' course. Tails slammed into the wall instead, a large cut in his cheek. He began to cry. Sonic's jaw dropped.

"Oh, shit, shit, shit, shit, what've I done?" Sonic yelped, running to Tails side. Tails punched him square in the face. He flew up and yelled, "G-Go on, watch m-me leave this shit-heap you c-call a home, you bastards!" cried Tails, before flying straight out the door, slamming it behind him.

Sonic walked over to the corner of the room and leaned his head against it. "What have I done?" he told himself.

"Relax, Sonic, let him learn what it's like to be an adult. Let him live by himself for a while."

"Sally, you don't understand. Tails is eight years old. He will most certainly die by himself. He won't come anywhere near you or me now. Fully sick one to insult him like that. Are you brain-dead?"

"What? So I pull the lame "you were an accident" insult on him, and he psyches up like a complete idiot. He's acting like his parents are dead!"

"They are, imbecile!"

"Oh…shit." Sally put on a look of guilt. "Dude, I didn't know that!"

"Oh yeah. His parents were abducted when he was only a baby. He had to fend for himself for eight years! Do you know how difficult that is to grow up with no parents? Damn friggin' impossible, that's what. Then, you pull the "genetic defect" insult on him. Did you notice that he has two tails? Are you mad? That is just the thing that would set him in a complete rage. He was teased non-stop about his tails at school. Non-stop. Do you not know conduct for casual insults or something? Seriously, don't tease someone about something they have or haven't got. You idiot. And then you pay out his name! So what if it sounds like something else? Way to go, Sally, you just broke a very strong bond between you and Tails. He respected you. He respected me. I was his role model. So instead, you start whining and moaning about Tails' incompetence. Now he hates you, and he hates me. Happy?"

"Look. I didn't know."

"See, now you're starting to sound like Tails! Everyone makes mistakes! Your mistakes are a quadrillion times worse than all three of Tails' mistakes put together. He will, in the worst-case situation, commit suicide you know! He's been unhappy lately. How will you feel then? Pleased? Delighted? Overjoyed?"

"No. I didn't mean –"

"See? More excuses. Grow up, Sally. Put yourself in other people's situations before you go breaking bonds." Sonic yelled, before racing out the door to find Tails.


	2. Some Gainful Reassurance

**I have decided now in response to reviews that words more offensive than "shit" won't be included in this fic (after chapter 2). I don't want to limit the amount of people who can read this so I'm keeping it at a borderline M. But if you are even reading this, then you agreed to the disclaimer in chapter one and can't sue anyway  
**

* * *

Tails flew as fast as his tails would carry him. He flew till he was exhausted, whereby he flew to the ground and began sobbing his heart out. 

"Why does everybody hate me!" he wailed to the now dusky sky. "How come I can't do anything right? Why is Aunt Sally so mean? God, help me!" he cried out loud.

"Oh, come on mate, cheer up." said a voice. Tails started and turned. It was Knuckles.

"Oh, hey K-Knux," sniffed Tails. Knuckles immediately saw the gash on Tails' cheek where Sonic's spin attack had hit him.

"Shit, who did that?" he gasped.

"Sonic did."

"Why?"

"Cause he hates me. Everyone h-hates me. Cause I d-do everything wrong." Tails cried, bursting into a fresh wave of tears.

"No, they don't. Who hates you?"

"S-Sally does. And you and Shadow. From when you h-had to put out the f-fire in my garage, 'member?" Tails sniffed.

"Hey, I don't hate you." Knuckles reassured Tails, kneeling down next to where Tails was sitting, "No one's perfect, and accidents happen."

"A-Aunt Sally said that I was an accident and that I was j-just a genetic defect."

"Well, that's not true. I knew your parents; of course you were planned, buddy. And don't believe anything that Sally says about genes, okay? You know full well why you've got two tails, don't you?" said Knuckles comfortingly.

"No, why?" sniffed Tails.

"Cause you're special, that's why. I bet all those kids only teased you cause they were jealous that you could fly and they couldn't."

"Really?"

"Sure! You the coolest when you fly. Who else do you know flies without one of your pro airplanes?"

"No one?"

"Exactly. That's why you're the coolest, man."

"Thanks, Knux," Tails gave him a watery smile.

"Now, why don't you come back with me and I'll get Aunt Sally to apologize about those nasty things she said to you."

"I'm not going back." Said Tails blandly. "Period."

"Come on, bud. Give 'em one more chance?"

"No. I'm not going back. Everyone hates me in Shi- I mean, Knothole."

"Tails, no one hates you for those little things. I don't care that I had to eat a chilidog with onion on Monday. Heck, I thought it was pretty good. See? If you hadn't forgotten the order, I would have eaten the regular one, and I would never have found out how tasty onions are."

"Yeah, but that's you. I'll bet everyone else has something against me."

"No, they don't. Come on. Give it a go."

"Well... let me think it over."

"Sure. Come back whenever you're ready." said Knuckles. He gave Tails a gentle pat on the shoulder and walked off into the night.

Tails thought about what he had said. _It's funny... usually Knuckles is more full on and not sympathetic. Maybe he was honestly trying to cheer me up. Well, if I do go back, I can hang with Knux if I'm bored_. Feeling better, Tails took a breath and started to fly home.

* * *

Sonic arrived home exhausted. He had searched Knothole high and low, in every nook and cranny, and he was nowhere to be seen. It was night, and Sonic was starting to get very worried. 

"Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit," he told himself over and over again. "Perhaps I should try Tails' house, I haven't tried there yet," and he gathered his last ounce of energy and sprinted off towards where Tails lived.

Tails arrived home, also exhausted. It was well into the night now, and it had started to get cold. Tails landed outside his house and went inside. He built a fire, put a bandage on the gash on his face and curled up on the couch opposite the fireplace to settle down. He had almost fallen asleep when there was a knock on the door. Tails groped for the CCTV remote and switched it on. It was Sonic.

"Fuck off, Sonic."

"I'm sorry, Tails." Sonic called from outside. His voice sounded very upset.

"I told you to fuck off,"

"I'm sorry. Can you forgive me?"

"What part of "fuck off Sonic" is difficult to understand?"

"Can I come in for one second?"

"What, so you can hurt me again?" Tears welled in Tails' eyes as he remembered it.

"Look, I am so sorry about what happened; can I come in for one second, please?"

"Okay, but no funny stuff."

"Righto." Sonic opened the door. He walked over to the couch opposite Tails' bed and sat down, facing Tails. His eyes were red and puffy: crying.

"So, what did you want to tell me?" asked Tails.

"Well first, I'm really sorry about what Sally said to you."

"Humph,"

"Well, I had a good old shout at her after you left because frankly, what she said was really mean."

Tails rolled his eyes. "When did you notice that, Sonic?" he said sardonically, "I thought you were supposed to be the quick one around here,"

"Yeah, anyways, she didn't know that your parents are… you know?"

"Dead?"

"Yeah, so she felt really bad about what she said and everything."

"So she should,"

"And second, I want to apologize about when I spin-attacked you."

Tails absent-mindedly put his paw where the graze was.

"Is it bad?" Sonic asked, worried.

"It bled a little, but no biggie."

"Good. Um, do you want any help over the next couple of days, while your face heals?"

Tails was taken-aback. "Er, thanks, Sonic. I, um, don't you have work to do?"

"Well, yeah, but, since you're my best pal, it's only fair that I stick around and give you hand cause I hurt your face and all."

"Well, I, um, I suppose I'll need a bit of a hand…"

"Cool. I'll be over tomorrow morning. Get a bit of a rest."

Sonic looked very relieved. He stood up and shook Tails' hand.

"Friends?"

"Friends,"

"See ya, bud," said Sonic as he walked out the door.

Tails suddenly heard something move outside. He got up, and listened carefully. Something rustled again outside. Tails opened he door and looked around. Something rustled from inside a bush. He peered inside. There was a power ring, glowing red and vibrating. Tails picked it up. It was warm. He went back inside and got into bed still holding it, though it had stopped glowing. Tails shut his eyes and contemplated what had happened that day. He fell asleep. He dreamed of the fight in Sally's house, flying to Angel Island, meeting Knuckles. However, all throughout the dream one thing kept pumping through his head. "Let me go, everyone here hates me, so take me somewhere where I'm appreciated,"

Then the ring began glowing again…


	3. Where the Hell did Mobius go?

Author Notes: In response to some of the reviews from previous chapters, I only put in the severe cussing during the fight. I'll avoid using terrible words and phrases in future chappies. RR, please!

* * *

Tails opened his eyes. He groaned. 

"Ugh, I feel terrible!"

He sat up. He was no longer in his bed. Or at home. Or even in Mobius. In fact, the only things he knew he was was hungry and uncomfortable. He stood up. His stomach grumbled. He noticed that the power ring was gone. Lastly, he noticed that there was no longer a bandage where Sonic a hit him in the face. There was still a scar, however.

"Bugger! I hope I didn't lose it. Sally would be so-" He stopped short. He already knew that. Looking around, Tails noticed that he seemed to have slept on the ground behind some shrubs. Spying an apple tree in the centre of the park mid-stretch, Tails headed over and began consuming his body weight in fruit. He would have preferred something with a lot of sugar in it (as you do), but he was hungry, so he didn't care. He was starting his fifth apple when a noise came from behind him. Tails turned in time to see a massive dog with flames for fur jump at him. Tails was used to such surprises as Sonic did it all the time to him in the workshop so he didn't flinch.

"Er, hello..." Tails said cautiously. The dog growled.

"You find something, Arcanine?" yelled a voice from outside the park. Tails turned. It was a boy of about 13. He had brown hair and was wearing a purple T-Shirt. Six cheerleaders followed him.

"Gary, Gary, he's our man, if can't do it no one can!" they chanted.

"Oh, wow, a new Pokémon!" said the boy, and he ran to Tails.

"An Overlander!" Tails cried. He set himself to fly, but then remembered the Arcanine that was stalking him.

"Hey, it talks too! Sweet! I, Gary Oak, the best trainer in the world, shall capture this rare Pokémon!"

Tails cocked his head to one side. "What was that about? For a start, I am not a Pokémon, whatever that is. Second, I prefer not to be referred to as "it". I have a gender you know! You should have taken the time to notice that I am NOT female!"

"Wha- how dare you insult I! Get'm Arcanine!"

Tails turned. A blast of flames came out of the Arcanine's mouth. Tails just managed to dodge it.

"Again!"

Tails was forced to duck as a jet of molten flame threatened to burn him to crisp.

"Hey Gary, I challenge you to a battle!" called a voice from behind them.

Gary turned. "Oh, it's you. Sorry, Ash, no time for losers like yourself at the moment."

"What? You afraid to lose?" retorted the black-haired boy whose name was Ash.

"No, I'm catching a new kind of Pokémon."

"A new Pokémon? Then it's mine! Go Pikachu, Thunderbolt Gary's Arcanine and get the new Pokémon!"

Tails watched in horror as the "Pikachu" summoned a bolt of lightning and struck the Arcanine. Then, he ran. Pikachu chased after Tails, and Gary used a marble-like red-and-white ball and another Pokémon came out.

"Go, Fearow!" Gary yelled. "Get that Pikachu!"

A massive bird flew out of the ball. Ash retaliated by sending out a "Pidgeot".

The two birds fought each other in mid-air, and Tails seized the opportunity to run. People seemed to hate him wherever he went. He actually would have preferred to be home,.. with Sonic to look after him.

Gary noticed Tails making the getaway. "Fearow, dive-bomb that Pokémon!"

"For, the last time I'm not a Pokémon!" said Tails, stopping to criticize Gary. Fearow slammed him straight into a tree. Tails felt his arm snap with aa sickening _crack_. He howled in pain. Blood leaked from his face as the healing cut opened once again.

"Right, now Pidgeot, get in and finish it off!" Ash yelled.

"No, just stop! Please, stop hurting me!" Tails yelled.

Ash stopped dead in his tracks. "Gary, we shouldn't capture that Pokémon."

"Why not?" Gary sneered back at him.

"It talks. It's just not right."

"Oh shut up you whiner. Fearow! Finish of the Pokémon!"

"Gary, NO! Pidgeot! Intercept!"

The two birds took a collision. Tails sighed with relief. One more hit and he would have been "finished off".

"Ugh, how dare you touch my Fearow! Get that Pidgeot, Fearow!"

"I don't think so!" called a voice from behind the commotion. Everyone turned. A blue-haired policewoman was standing looking at them disapprovingly.

"You know not to battle in a public area. Go on! Shoo!"

"Sorry, Officer," mumbled Gary, who recalled his Fearow and slunk off with his cheerleaders.

Ash and two other Overlanders ran over to Tails, who was sitting on the ground against the tree, dazed and groaning. On seeing them, he turned to keep running, although a sharp pain in his arm prevented him from moving, and the girl with red hair said, "Hey, stay here. We won't hurt you."

"Sure, that's what they all say," said Tails.

"See, I told you it's a talking Pokémon!" exclaimed Ash.

"I'm not a – what is a Pokémon anyway?"

"Dude, you're a Pokémon!" said Ash, "You should know that!"

"No, I'm not! I'm a Mobian Fox. You are Overlanders. I have no idea what a Pokémon is. And stop calling me "it". I'm a boy." replied Tails, thoroughly annoyed.

Ash looked confused. "Why are you calling us Overlanders?"

"What's a Mobian Fox?" asked another black-haired boy with pink headband.

"Wha? There are Mobians everywhere on Mobius!" sighed Tails, exasperated.

"Where's Mobius? Is that like a country?" asked Ash.

"Mobius is the name of this planet." Said Tails slowly, through gritted teeth.

"Sorry," replied Ash, "This planet is called Earth. I'm a human. And on Earth, if you're not human, you're a Pokémon."

The redhead interrupted. "Please, ignore my friend. He's an idiot. I'm Misty. That's Tracey and this is Ash. What's your name?"

"Uh, Miles Prower."

Ash raised an eyebrow. "Say, isn't that a –"

Tails sighed. "Please, I got enough of that at school. Just call me Tails."

Misty shrugged. "Fine with us. How did you get here, Tails?"

"I, er, I'm not actually sure really. First up, I got in this fight. Then a went off on my own for a bit. Then I found a power ring," the three "humans" raised their eyebrows, but Tails continued. "And I went to bed, and I had this nightmare about- actually, it's too much of a long story. I had a nightmare, then I woke up, and I was here."

"Whoa. Pretty rough night, eh?" commented Tracey.

"So, now what?" asked Ash, who appeared to have moved on. Misty shook her head in disgust.

"You ask if the poor thing you just attacked is okay, imbecile!"

Ash glanced at Tails. "It looks okay."

Tails also shook his head disgust. "Have you failed to notice that I am bleeding and my arm is broken? Also, for the last time, I am male! A boy! An eight-year-old male Mobian Fox! Or do you refer to all genders as "it" on Earth?" yelled Tails, infuriated.

Misty stepped in before Ash could answer. "Oh, my God, he is too! Tracey, where's the nearest Pokémon Centre? Get some bandages, before he hurts himself more!" she lowered her voice, "Listen, about Ash. Like I said before, ignore him. He's just ticked off cause he didn't get to battle Gary. They're rivals."

"Evidently," noted Tails, seeing Ash sulking in the background. Once they realised he was a boy, they could be pretty cool. Much better than Sonic and his friends. Tracey bandaged Tails' cut and put his arm in a brace. Then they set off in the direction of the Pokémon Centre.

After walking what seemed like miles, Misty sparked a conversation.

"So, Tails, er, do all Mobian Foxes have two tails?" she asked curiously.

Tails blushed slightly. "Um, no actually. I'm kinda unique."

"Prefer not to talk about it, eh?" asked Tracey.

"Well, not my favourite subject, really." replied Tails.

"So, what happened back at Mobius?" asked Misty.

"Well, my friend, Sonic – actually, I wonder what Sonic's doing right now?"


	4. Where the Hell did Tails go?

"Hey, Tails, I brought some brekkie for ya!" called Sonic, through Tails' front door.

"Tails? Must be still asleep, poor kid," muttered Sonic, opening the door with the spare key. He stepped inside.

"Tails? Tails, buddy, where are you? Tails!" Sonic put the tray of food on the kitchen bench and began searching the house.

* * *

Tails finally arrived at the Pokémon Centre. They rushed inside.

"Nurse Joy! We need you to heal our Pokémon!" called Ash, ringing the service bell impatiently. She came out, with a happy face.

"Certainly. Just put your Pokéballs here," she replied, pulling out a tray from under the service desk.

Ash put five Pokéballs and one Pikachu on the tray.

"Here," he said, ignoring Tails. Misty gave him a sharp nudge.

"Oh, yeah, um, we found this at Central Park. I'm not sure if it's a Pokémon or-"

Tails glared at Ash for referring to him as "this". Misty interrupted hastily. "Yeah, we found him at the Central Park. We think it's a new Pokémon. A talking one."

"Oh, of course. We'll get that arm fixed up in a jiffy! You'll need to put him a Pokéball of course," replied Joy.

Tails was very shocked. "I'm not going in a ball!"

"All right, then. You don't have to go in one if you don't want to. Come back in about ten minutes, okay?"

"Cool, see you then!" replied Misty.

Misty, Tracey and Ash walked over to the waiting area.

"Say "he", Ash." ordered Misty.

"What? He."

"Was it hard?"

"No, of course not!"

"Try "him", then."

"Him."

"Was that hard?"

"No! Where is this going anyways?"

"So, why can't you call Tails "him" then? Are you so dense that you can't tell HE's a boy? Or are you going deaf, and missing the vital point HE is making that HE is a boy?"

"Well, actually -"

"It was a rhetorical question, Ash."

"Oh, sorry. So, call it "he" from now on, then?"

"You are dumber than I thought, Ash. Seriously."

Tracey, Misty and Ash talked amongst themselves for a while, then Nurse Joy came out, with Tails following, good as new.

"Here you go, everyone." Joy returned the Pokéballs and Pokémon to their rightful owners. She promptly returned to the service desk and continued a game of solitaire on the computer.

* * *

"Okay, Tails, this ain't funny anymore! Stop hiding now!" called Sonic, become panicky. "Where the Hell are you, Tails?" Sonic ran out the door to get a search party.

* * *

Tails' stomach growled again. He chuckled sheepishly.

"Um, any place here where we can get some food would be nice."

"Sure, what do you Mobians eat, eh?"

"Got any dolphin?" asked Tails sarcastically.

"Ha ha. Very funny, Tails. What do you eat, really?" asked Misty.

"Got chilidogs on this planet?"

"Yep, sounds good! Let's go." decided Ash, who set off in the direction of a nearby hot dog stand.

"Hi, er, I'd like one regular hot dog, a hot dog with cheese and onion, a hot dog with no ketchup, extra mustard, cheese and onion, and a chilidog with the lot."

The man at the stall furiously scribbled the order, took an age to total the price and mumbled, "Um, that'll be seventeen dollars eighty, thanks."

Tails, although reading the prices upside-down, did the sum in his head.

"Um, sir, you did the sum wrong. You carried a two when 30, 50, 60 and 40 only equal one Mobi- I mean, dollar eighty." he pointed out.

After checking the sum again, he reluctantly gave one dollar back to Ash and gave Tails a perfect death glare, before beginning on the hot dogs.

They took their food, and walked to a nearby bench to eat.

"Nice work, Tails!" complimented Misty.

"When?"

"Back then," Ash said, "If you hadn't double-checked the sum, we would have paid a dollar more."

"Yeah, we're pretty short on cash these days, eh, Ash? A dollar makes all the difference." commented Tracey, with just a hint of sarcasm.

"Tell me about it. If he hadn't done the sum, who knows whose hands it could've gotten into!" replied Ash, who missed the sardonic poke.

Tails was relieved to hear that Ash wasn't calling him "it" again.

"Even into Team Rocket's hands!" continued Ash.

"Actually, where is Team Rocket?" asked Misty, "They should've ambushed us at least half an hour ago. They always do on Saturdays!"

* * *

Meanwhile, deep in a nearby forest…

"Ugh, what time is it?" yawned James, waking up from an almost deathly sleep.

"Probably about eight o'clock." replied Jessie. She rummaged through a bag of meagre possessions and pulled out an old fob watch.

"Son of a – James! It's passed twelve o'clock! We should've ambushed the twerps half an hour ago!"

James yawned again. "It's too late to set up an ambush. Let's try, um, Plan H. Hmmm. Chapter 11, Sub-section C, Paragraph 6, Clause 12."

Jessie summoned a monstrous volume of books titled _Team Rocket Plans: Memorise and Destroy_, and selected one called "Volume 8: Plan H to I-b". She opened the contents and ran her finger down the page.

"Let's see, Chapter 11, Sub-section C, Paragraph 6, Clause 12. Here we go, page 11146 to 11148." She searched the colossal book, finally finding the right page.

"Okay. _'Use trademark balloon to catch victim by surprise. Be sure to mix fuel with a portion of Sodium Phosphate Dibasic Dodecahydrate to allow for an appropriate sound to be emitted from engine(s). Seek advise if you (a) Cannot fly a balloon, (b) Do not know what "appropriate sound" we are referring to, or (c) Are not a Team Rocket Member.' _Any Sodium Phosphate Dibasic Dodecahydrate left, James?" she quoted from the Book.

"Sure, Jessie, there's plenty right here!" replied James gleefully, summoning a petrol can marked, "POISON: Sodium Phosphate Dibasic Dodecahydrate".

"Let's go then," said Jessie, nudging Meowth awake with her foot. She pulled the balloon out from under a pile of trees, and poured the new fuel into the tank, before lighting the engine.

"Get in!" She said hurriedly. The other two clambered in, before the balloon began ascending, emitting a "whooooooooooooo, whoooooooooooooooo" sound that rose and fell with an uncanny resemblance to an ambulance siren.

* * *

"Who's Team Rocket anyway?" asked Tails, who had finished his chillidog with astonishing speed.

"You'll find out soon enough." replied Misty. "On another topic, I know you don't like to talk about it and all, but why do have two tails? I'm really curious."

"Well, I think when Mum was pregnant she went somewhere and a Chaos Emerald gave off this radiation and then I was born with two tails. I don't really remember Mum and Dad much, though. Anyway, I was teased a lot at school because I was smart and my name was Miles Prower, and especially because I had two tails. I didn't know it then, but I can fly with them. See?" Tails twisted his tails around and around and he rose into the air.

"Oh, wow! That's like, so cool, Tails!" cried Misty joyously.

"Yeah, I can fly for about half an hour, but it tires me quickly, so I usually walk, if don't need to get somewhere in a hurry."

"Shall we go to Fire Island?" asked Ash after studying a map. "There's a gym there, so I can get my Fire Badge as well. It'll be like a win/win situation because I get a badge, and we get a break from the mainland!

"Well, it seems like the idea is centred around you mostly, but okay," said Misty, "What do you think, Tails?"

"I don't mind," he replied as they set off towards the dock.

"...so how are we getting to Fire Island anyway?" asked Tails, "Don't tell me we're swimming. I can swim, but same story with flying. Too far and I just collapse."

"Oh, come on, Tails, you wimp! Surely you can manage ten miles, eh?" teased Tracey.

Tails blushed. "Actually, on Mobius, no one can really swim that far,"

"We're just kidding with you, mate," grinned Ash, giving Tails a friendly punch. "Truth is, hardly anyone on Earth can do it either. No. We use Lapras!" holding a shiny Pokéball in the air proudly.

Tails raised an eyebrow. "You sound just a conceited as that Overlander – I mean human, we saw before. With the cheerleaders."

"Oh. Gary. Believe me. Don't worry about him. I played a game of 'spot the brain cell' against him once and lost because I couldn't find any." said Ash darkly. Tails smiled. This wasn't so bad after all.

They walked down the beaten path that led out of the city and to the harbour. The city was just out of sight when the unmistakable sound of Team Rocket's balloon came into earshot.

"Here we go," said Misty, rolling her eyes.

"This is Team Rocket," said Ash, as the Meowth-shaped balloon rose of the forest that was to the North.

"Why is it making that noise?" asked Tails.

"Sodium something something Dodecahedron or something like that." said Misty, shaking her head in disgust. "They pump it with their fuel."

"Prepare for trouble!"

"And make it double!"

"To protest the Earth from dedication,"

"To surround a lake with beasts of burden,"

" To announce the evils of truth and lust."

"To repeat the, oh, screw it!" yelled a girl with long red hair.

"Late night, huh?" asked Ash, grinning.

"I see you've resorted to Plan H, Chapter 11, Sub-section C, Paragraph 6, Clause 12 again," noticed Misty, who couldn't help but smile.

"How is it that you know of the Book?" asked a boy with blue hair.

"Well, honestly, I'm not sure. I think we stumbled on it when we came across your headquarters once. Really, who would've thought a giant building with 'Team Rocket HQ' emblazoned over it would be a Team Rocket headquarters! What a coincidence!" replied Misty, her voice dripping with sarcasm.

"Humph. Well, there was a late meeting last night so how about we just skip the motto and go straight to stealing Squirtle?"

"Pikachu, you steal Pikachu."

"Sorry. How about we skip the motto and go straight to stealing Pikachu?"

"Well, I'm a nice guy and all, and what can I say?" said Ash, to a hopeful expression from Team Rocket.

"But I am not an idiot," he continued.

"Listen to this!" sniggered Misty, nudging Tails.

She received a glare from Ash, who continued, "I like your creativity though. I mean, asking politely is something you haven't tried yet."

"True, true," said Team Rocket.

"Anyway, how about I just blow you away with Thunder?"

"Actually, we'll just skip the whole stealing thing and go away ourselves, how about it?"

"Sounds good to me,"

"To the secret base!" shouted the blue-head, pointing Northeast.

"Way to go, James. How do we keep the secret base a bloody secret if you tell the twerps where it is all the time?"

"Sorry!"

They continued bickering until the balloon was out of sight. Tails raised an eyebrow. "Aaaaah. I'm scared," he said, sounding rather bored.

"They usually try harder than that. But mostly in vain." said Misty.

"Anyhow, shall we continue?" suggested Ash. "I can almost see the ocean."

"Right, then, eh?"

The trio plus Tails walked down the path. After walking about a quarter of a mile, they came to the shore, where Ash called out Lapras. A massive creature seemed to dissolve out the water. It was like a giant turtle cross the Loch Ness monster. Tails was shocked.

"We're riding that?"

"That's right," said Ash, "Any objections, you're swimming there."

"No objections, none at all," said Tails hurriedly.

"Good, then. Shall we go?" suggested Ash, jumping on to Lapras' back. Tails got on rather cautiously, as though it would sink if he moved. Lapras began moving, and Tails felt awkward.

"Mind if just fly a bit, stretch my tails?"

"Sure, go ahead,"

Tails flew into the air, glad to be off Lapras' back.

"Hey, Tails, d'you think you could keep that pose there, eh? Just while I do a quick sketch of you," asked Tracey, pulling out a notepad and getting a pencil ready.

"Sure, Tracey,"

"Don't worry, I'm a fast drawer,"

* * *

"What do you mean he's gone?" asked St. John.

"You, heard me, skunk! I went to his place this morning and he wasn't home at all! Not a trace!"

"Well, I'll get a search party ready for tomorrow, then," replied St. John.

"Arrgh, we need it today! Imbecile!"

"It's tomorrow or never, hedgehog."

"I thought the expression was, "It's now or never", skunk," Sonic sneered. St. John opened his mouth to retaliate, but he was interrupted.

"Sonic Hedgehog!"

Sonic tensed up. He turned slowly. Amy was standing at the door of her home.

"I'm in deep shit now," he muttered to himself.

"What was that?" Amy snapped.

"Nothing, nothing, Amy."

"Why aren't you at home?"

"I'm looking for Tails. He disappeared."

"Excuses, excuses. GET HOME NOW!"

"Yes, Amy. Of course Amy." Sonic shuffled off, seemingly hanging his head in shame.

"Taking orders from a twelve year old! That's sad, hedgehog! Sad, sad, sad!"

Sonic ignored St. John, who was rolling around laughing at him, and went inside his house. On his desk lay his ten billionth power-ring, glowing red.

"Hmmm, that's funny. A red power ring?" Sonic touched it. It was warm and vibrating. Then, it cooled off, become a regular power ring again. Holding it tightly, he prayed that wherever Tails was, he was safe. He also prayed that he could be where Tails was." Suddenly, the ring began glowing again. It grew very hot, until it almost began to burn Sonic's hands, but he couldn't let go of it. Suddenly it began vibrating, and then, it stopped.

"Sonic!" called Amy, who had invited herself in, "Sonic? Where did you go?"

* * *

"Uh, Tracey?" asked Tails, twenty-eight minutes after remaining in the same flying pose, "You done yet?"

"Nearly, just wait a couple of seconds, eh?"

Tails groaned. Flying was tiring in itself, but holding a pose drained your energy even more.

"Done,"

Tails flew down to Tracey's sketchpad and looked at the pencil drawing.

"Wow, Tracey, that's really good!" Tails complimented. "It looks exactly like me!"

"Gimme a look! Gimme a look! demanded Ash, running over and pushing both Tails and Tracey into the water.

Soaking wet and laughing, they began splashing each other. Tails decided to get his revenge on Ash by doing a spin attack and spraying water on him.

"Hey! I'm getting wet, stop!" he cried.

"Hey, Ash, come for swim with us, eh?" laughed Tracey pulling him in. Ash spontaneously grabbed Misty, and the pair of them went for unexpected date with the ocean.

"Water fight!" yelled Ash.

"Enough!" interrupted Misty, "I'm cold, soaking wet and swimming five miles out to sea! Let's just get to bloody Fire Island, please!"

"Agreed." Came a spontaneous reply.

Tails was the first dry, as he wasn't wearing anything. It was sunny however, and Ash, Misty and Tracey soon dried off in the heat. After another half an hour, they reached the bustling marketplace of Fire Island.

"Oh God, look at all these shops! Well, boys, I'm off for some bargain hunting. See you in about an hour."

"Sure, whatever," replied Ash, uninterested.

The "boys" walked over to a park, and Tracey bought a map.

"See, the Gym's this way," said Ash, pointing up the path that led to a large building that had an even larger sign which said "GYM".

Tails sighed. "Gee, thanks Ash for stating the blatantly obvious,"

"Shut up,"

"Bring it!"

"How about you just quit while you're ahead, eh?" sighed Tracey.

Tails glared at Ash. Ash glared back.

"Before a war starts, preferably,"

"Okay, what do we do then?"

"Well, you could not squabble for like, fifteen minutes while I sketch the ocean?"

So instead Ash and Tails compared their lives and worlds for fifteen minutes, before deciding.

"Okay, so your life has more credit and adventure," Tails reviewed.

"But I am smarter, younger, more mature, have a higher IQ, know more about mechanics, can fly and swim, support my own life, and can write my own name without making a spelling mistake." he finished.

"Hey, not fair! I can so write my name,"

"Presumably because it's three letters long. There's only…" Tails did a quick sum in his head, "…17576 different possibilities, so you just need to keep trying until you find one that looks right,"

"Why you!"

"Cut it out for just ten seconds please!" yelled Tracey in exasperation.

"Sorry," Ash apologized.

Minutes passed…

"Hey, Ash, where's the bathroom?"

"What?"

"Where's the bathroom?"

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"You know… come on Ash, cut it out! Where's the bathroom?"

"What the hell is a "bathroom"?"

"No, seriously, Ash, I gotta take a leak! Where's the bathroom?"

"What's that supposed to mean?" asked Ash, smiling.

"You mean, you don't -"

"Don't what?"

"Use the bathroom?"

Tracey watched the whole ordeal.

'No, I've never heard of it,"

"Are you serious?" asked Tails, shifting from foot to foot. Tracey noticed Tails getting desperate.

"See that road there, eh, Tails?"

Tails turned. "Yeah,"

"Down that road. There's toilets there, eh."

"Thanks, Tracey," said Tails, before sprinting off.

"Why'd you tell him?" asked Ash, disappointed.

"Because you just don't know when enough being cruel is enough."

"I was just having some fun,"

"Didn't look fun to him. That's sinking pretty low, Ash. Using his newness to Earth to your advantage is way uncool. Hang your head in shame, eh?"

Misty returned, arms full with possibly hundreds of dollars worth of merchandise.

"Hey, guys. Where's Tails?"

"Toilet," replied Ash grimly.

"You didn't pull that trick again, did you?"

"He tried. You know what I mean, eh?" winked Tracey.

"You are cruel, Ash. You know that? Cruel, cruel, cruel."

"What? I was just having some fun,"

"That's what they all say. I don't know why I became friends with you."

"I suppose it was pretty mean,"

"How would you like it if you were warped to Mobius and you need to go, and they just acted like they didn't know what you were on about just to watch you wet yourself. You are so sick. It's just wrong!"

Tails returned looking relieved.

"So, are we ready to go yet?" Ash said, making a futile attempt to change the subject.

"No, we've got more lecturing planned,"

"What are we talking about, anyway?" asked Tails.

"We're lecturing Ash about the cruel trick he played on you."

Tails looked shocked. "I don't want any trouble. Seriously, I can take a joke. Back on Mobius, people would've done that as well. Don't fight, please."

"Don't like fighting much, eh?" smiled Tracey.

"Not really…" replied Tails bluntly.

"If you say so. Anyway, the Fire Gym is a fire gym, so we need a water Pokémon. Bring on, Lapras!"


	5. Pain is Painful

Author Notes: I'm changing this to first person Tails! YAY! Next chapter it'll go back to third person, I just feel like writing POV today. I may change into Sonic POV later in chapter.

* * *

I opened my eyes. Looking around, I saw Ash, Misty and Tracey asleep in their beds. I crept into the bathroom and took a shower.

"Just another day on Earth," I told myself as water ran over me "I wonder if Team Rocket will come today?"

I finished my shower, dried off, and went outside. It was nine o'clock. The three humans were still asleep. I gently roused them awake. I soon discovered waking humans didn't prove as beneficial as it did waking Sonic. They seemed quite annoyed at being woken up. I apologized profusely, and they seemed to take it okay, Misty saying that,

"If you hadn't woken us, we would have slept in. Ash has passed on bad habits."

Ash retaliated with a brilliant "Shut up!"

"Great call, Ash." remarked Tracey sarcastically, who had abandoned his Kiwi accent.

"Thanks,"

"Where're we going for breakfast?" I asked the trio.

"I dunno. It's Ash's turn to pick unfortunately. He'll want to skip breakfast to get to the gym quickly."

"Oh, yeah! That gym thing's today isn't it!" I remembered.

"All right! Let's go for it!" yelled Ash enthusiastically.

Tracey and Misty sweat-dropped. I raised an eyebrow. But alas, we walked out of the Centre, and towards the gym, but Team Rocket rudely interrupted us.

"Right on schedule…" sighed Misty.

Jessie and James cleared their throats.

"Prepare for trouble!"

"And make that double!"

"To protect the world from devastation!"

"To unite all people's within our nation!"

"To denounce the evils of truth and love!"

"To extend our reach to the stars above!"

"Jessie!"

"James!"

"Team Rocket blasting off at the speed of light!"

"Surrender now or prepare to fight!"

"Meowth, that's right!" said a Pokémon that was standing with Jesse and James. It must be unique, I thought. But still, I couldn't help but wonder...

"Er, okay… what exactly was the point of that?"

Team Rocket's jaws dropped. My friends burst out laughing.

"What'd I say?" I asked, hoping I hadn't said anything stupid.

"We've been wanting to know that for years!" laughed Ash, doubled-over.

"How dare you insult our pride! You insolent little – what are you anyways?"

"Pride?" sniggered Tracey, "You destroyed what little _pride_ you had left yesterday! Although, do accept our congratulations - you remembered your own motto today!"

"Argh, I'll get you! Arbok! Get them!" yelled Jessie.

A massive purple snake came out of its Pokéball, hissing at me.

"Uh oh, not good," I muttered to myself as it charged towards me. I ran, but Arbok hit me square in the collarbone. CRACK! A wave of pain hit me in one go. Shit. As if I haven't already injured myself enough in two days, then I go and break my collarbone.

"Ash, you idiot! Help him!" shouted Misty.

"Oh, right. Pikachu, use Thunder!"

Pikachu summoned a lightning bolt from the sky. I cringed as an enormous clap of thunder followed. Arbok went crashing into Team Rocket, who went flying back towards the beach.

"They just don't give up." Misty sighed. "Are you okay, Tails?" she asked leaning down next where I was. She placed her hand on my shoulder.

"I've had better days," I replied, wincing as another spasm of pain shot through my body. "Don't touch there - it hurts."

"Oh, sorry," replied Misty apologetically.

"I wonder what Sonic's doing right now?" My mind drifted as I remembered Sonic…

* * *

I opened my eyes. 

"What the-"

This place was like nowhere on Mobius. There were tropical trees, strange animals, and worst of all, Overlanders. I crept out of the bushes where I had woken up and walked onto the beach. It was empty.

That's funny, I thought, I'll bet Amy and Cream and that would just die if they saw this place. Where is everybody?

I walked closer to the shore, making sure not to touch the water. Two Overlanders and a strange cat floated to the coast.

"Do all Overlanders 'round here swim fully clothed? Or are you just idiots?" I sniggered.

A blue-haired boy splashed me. I let out an ear-splitting scream.

* * *

"Hey did you guys hear that?" I asked. 

"What is it, Tails?"

"It couldn't be… how did he-"

"What is it?"

"I...nothing."

* * *

I rolled around on the beach in agony. 

"IT BURNS, IT BURNS!" I screamed.

The two Overlanders raised their eyebrows.

"Must be allergic to water," remarked the blue-head.

"What an idiot," said the redhead, shaking her head in disgust.

"He's exactly like dat other one we saw with da twoips," said the cat.

I stopped screaming instantly. "You saw Tails? Where?"

"Well, we could tell you,"

"But we're not going to,"

"What we will do is hurt you for insulting us! Go, Weezing!"

A strange creature popped out of a red-and-white ball. It was emitting foul smoke. It spewed a pile of toxic sludge.

"Don't think so!" I yelled. I launched a spin attack on it, knocking it a clear hundred meters. I revved up to run, leaving the Overlanders in a cloud of dust.

"Such an incredible Pokémon!" I heard one say.

"Agreed. Pikachu can wait, we must capture for the boss!" the other said.

But I was out of earshot.

* * *

"We'd better get you back to the Centre. Ash, the gym can wait," said Misty. 

"No, Ash can go to the gym on his own, can't he? I'd feel awful if I made him miss his battle," I said, speaking the truth.

Misty looked doubtful. "Well, okay…"

Ash jumped and punched the air.

"All right! You're the best, Misty!"

"We'd better go," Misty told me. We set off back to the Centre. Tracey didn't know how to put a brace on a broken collarbone, so I just made sure not to trip or hurt myself more. We eventually made it to the Centre. Standing outside it, I carefully flew up to see if Sonic was anywhere to be seen.

"Tails, what are you doing?" Misty asked worriedly. "Don't fly while you're hurt!"

"I'll be right," I told her confidently. I looked around from about fifteen meters up. I could see Ash on his way up to the gym. I could see Team Rocket in the rainforest. I could see everything. Then suddenly, I saw it. A blue flash. Running through the forest. Sonic _was _here. I was so surprised I stopped spinning my tails, which proved to be a mistake.

"Are you okay, Tails?"

I groaned. More pain. "Ouch. There goes my other arm."

"At least you won't have to walk far,"

Misty helped me up and took me inside. This Centre was built differently to the other one. The whole room was styled blue, with contrasting maroon furniture. Misty rushed me over to the service desk. She pressed the "EMERGENCY" button, and Nurse Joy rushed out.

"Nurse, look at my Pokémon! I think it broke some bones in a battle!"

I opened my mouth to say I wasn't a Pokémon, but Misty gave me a nudge. I got the message and played along with her.

"Oh my goodness, I've never seen a specie like this before,"

"I'm a new type of Pokémon. A fox."

"It talks?" asked Joy, shocked. "Amazing. A talking Pokémon. Just pop him his ball,"

"Er, he doesn't like his Pokéball," Misty said hastily.

"Well, that's fine. Follow me," instructed the Nurse, disapprovingly.

I followed the Nurse through a door. There were Pokémon on hospital beds. She called over a "Chansey" and told it to get a bed.

I ran into the forest. I searched everywhere, running into a clearing to take a break, as I was exhausted. I took a fatal step. The rope in the trap pulled and tangled me in a net, hanging from a tree. I spin-attacked the net, seeing Team Rocket in the process. The net fell to the ground, in pieces.

"Ha!" I gloated, "You thought you could get me that easily?"

Then the dirt I was standing on collapsed under me.

Bugger.

"Ha!" they gloated at me, "You thought we wouldn't know you would do that?"

"Arbok, teach him a lesson!"

I watched in horror as a purple snake crashed into the trap hole. Poison. I hate that.

* * *

I woke up. Last I remember was getting a needle. A general anaesthetic. I got up. I shivered. _Blast this air-conditioning_. I walked outside into the waiting area. Misty was reading a magazine in the lounge and drinking a cup of coffee with Tracey. She saw me and rushed over.

"Tails! You're okay!"

"Yeah, I'm fine. How long were you waiting?"

"Only an hour or so. Coffee?"

Better not go there again. "No thanks,"

"Ash's probably finished his battle by now. You wanna go see how he went?"

"Sure, why not?"

We walked outside. A blast of warm air hit me.

"Getting used to the transition, I see," grinned Tracey, who obviously noticed me jump.

"Yeah. Why do you use it?"

He shrugged. "Dunno, probably to pollute the air with CFCs and poisonous chemicals that will eat the ozone layer, leaving us vulnerable to global warming, causing an overall raise of temperatures, and will mean more people use air-conditioners, polluting the air in an endless loop."

"Don't be stupid, Tracey. This is Earth. That will never happen." said Misty dismissively.

We walked towards the gym. Ash was standing sulking outside the gym.

"Gary beat you to it, huh?" asked Misty.

"Yup,"


	6. Enter the Fray

"Don't worry about it, Ash," Misty told him, who was making a pose similar to the one you make when you embarrass yourself in front of thousands of people. 

"My life is ruined!" he cried.

Then Gary walked out the Gym Door, followed by his cheerleaders who were sobbing and grieving.

"Hey, it's Ash," Gary noticed, ignoring his cheerleaders. "You taking the gym challenge?"

Ash nodded.

"Well, I warn ya, this Gym Leader is hot stuff. Literally. I was creamed so much you could have pasteurised, homogenised and packaged me into cream cans so I could be sprayed onto cakes and-"

"Okay, we get the point, Gary" said Misty, sweat dropping.

"Well, then, I'd better be off. Good luck Ash, you're gonna need as much of it as you can get."

Ash scowled, but walked into the gym, followed by Misty, Tracey and Tails.

He walked down the long hall, ever looking at the digitised sign at the end of the hallway.

It read:

CHALLENGES: 102 VICTORIES: 100 LOSSES: 2

"Well, that's reassuring," Ash groaned.

"Don't sweat it, Ash," Tails said to him, "You'll have no problems kicking their butt."

"Thanks, Tails," replied Ash, smiling with a boost of confidence.

He opened the door when they reached it.

"Here goes nothing," Ash murmured.

The room was completely dark, except for a single tracking light that followed Ash's line-of-sight. In the background, a cello and double bass hit one single, continuous low note, giving a mysterious effect to the scene. Ash traced up the path that led to a few stairs, which ascended to a marble platform, and there, the gym leader stood…

They were wearing a pair of baggy black tracksuit pants, with a flame pattern emblazoned up to the knees. Up about 30 centimetres, Ash saw a tight-fitting, deep ochre polo shirt. Further up a little more, a slight bulge was noticeable around the chest area. Ash dismissed it. He continued looking up. A now obvious orchestra was playing in harmony on one long, mysterious note. The string section began making abrupt screeching notes (think of the Simpson's episode where Homer is in the forest by himself, and the bus full of musicians is driving down the road) as Ash looked on to the gentle ladylike face of the-

"Wait up there!" yelled Ash, "The Gym Leader's a girl?"

The young lady standing on the platform sighed loudly. "Well, what did you expect, imbecile? Does every gym leader have to be a male? When are you going to stop being such sexists?" she groaned, with a beautiful Scottish accent. She was rather tall, and about sixteen years old. She clicked her fingers and the roof pulled itself back, revealing floodlights that were promptly switched on, illuminating the arena with fierce intensity. The orchestra revealed themselves, though they were completely silent, waiting for the signal.

"Why is she talking like that?" asked Tails. Mobius was one country with a universal accent.

"She's Scottish," Misty schooled Tails, "Every country has their own accent."

"I see,"

"Right, then. Which of you ones wishes to battle me?"

Ash stepped forward. "I do," he said determinedly.

"Right, another wee young lad," she commented, "I've already had a one-on-one today, leaving only a three-on-three remaining,"

"Let's begin," Ash said quietly. "I, Ash Ketchum, of Pallet Town, challenge you to a battle!"

"Right. I, Blaize O'Shannesy, from the Kyle of Lochalsh-"

"Where the Hell is the Kyle of Lochalsh?" Ash interrupted rudely.

"Scotland," replied Blaize, with a tone of coldness and possible wonder of stupidity. "As I was saying, this will be a three-on-three match for the Magma Badge." she clicked her fingers. The band began vigorously playing Pokémon battle tunes.

"I choose you, Charizard!" yelled Blaize.

"Go! Pikachu!" Ash called his beloved Pokémon.

The two Pokémon entered the scene of action, waiting their opponent's move.

"Pikachu, use a Thunder Wave on it!"

Pikachu dashed within range on the Charizard, and sparked a jolt of electricity at the dragon. Charizard merely dodged it, before blowing a blast of flame at the yellow mouse.

"God, Charizard already knows what to do!" yelled Ash in dismay.

"Keep it up, Ash, we're rooting for you!" cheered the trio, who were watching the battle intently.

"Pikachu, use Rain Dance!"

Pikachu began calling to the sky, performing a seemingly sacred dance. Rainclouds began forming in the atmosphere, and Pikachu continued singing, dodging Embers every now and then. Soon, the clouds were teeming with water, and Pikachu made one final call, and a single drop fell. Charizard let out a roar as thousands of millions of raindrops began simultaneously falling to the ground. Blowing fire into the air, it flew as high as it could, to avoid the rain.

"Pikachu, use Thunder!"

Pikachu once again summoned lightning from the sky, and it hit spot-on. Not only had Charizard had been hit by its weakness, being soaked by water and flying in mid-air intensified the electricity's power exponentially; so much so that the thunder that followed possibly continued at its full force for more than twenty seconds. Tails covered his ears. Ash punched the air as the Charizard fell to the ground, completely out of energy.

"All right!" he exclaimed joyously. Blaize narrowed her eyes.

"I choose you, Flareon!"

Flareon jumped gracefully as he exited his Pokéball. He began bounding and leaping joyously, as though it were a –

"Oh no, its using Sunny Day!" cried Ash. "I'm screwed now!"

He called Pikachu back and chose Lapras.

Misty sighed.

"What is it?" asked Tails, with an inquisitive tone.

"He's doing exactly what I hoped he wouldn't do," she said, "Blaize is saving her best Pokémon for last, and if Lapras gets KO'd, Ash is done for."

"How do you know?"

"I used to be a gym leader," she said.

Meanwhile, battle had been raging ferociously. Lapras had confused Flareon, and was using Bubblebeam to try and reduce her energy. Flareon was attempting to shake off his confusion, but the ray of flashing light had well befuddled him. Finally, he used an Attract attack on Lapras, and used proficiencies that Ash had never witnessed more powerful. Lapras had become infatuated.

Ash was grinding his teeth.

"Come on, Lapras, Bubblebeam him again!"

But Lapras wouldn't budge. That is, until she was hit by a colossal Fire Spin technique. She called loudly and used Mist to conceal herself and dampen the air so he flame vortex would die. The fog descended quickly, shrouding Lapras in a thick layer of cloud. Flareon evidently hadn't been trained in that situation, as he was now taking orders from Blaize aurally.

But Blaize, too, was panicking slightly. Trained with constant supervision from her grandfather, she was under the impression that she was virtually unbeatable in all situations. This unknowing of what to do made her lose her nerve slightly.

"Er, Flareon, aim a Flamethrower through the Mist!"

This didn't seem a very good strategy, as there was no visible target, but Flareon loyally obeyed his master, shooting pure fire through the fog, using a sweeping motion to try and locate the hidden Pokémon.

Lapras looked cautiously through the fog she was accustomed to seeing in, making sure that nothing would harm her. She heard the Flamethrower about six or seven meters away. Turning slowly to face it, she wished silently that she were able to move faster on land. Being so large, fast-moving Lapras' on land were as scarce as air in space. She watched the fire, ready to make a move if it came close. The flame seemed to track along in the Mist, blindly searching. Instinctively, Lapras fired a Bubblebeam when the fire came near. A hiss of steam issued from the flame, but the beam was only strong enough to stall it.

Instantly, Flareon stopped firing, took a deep breath a launched a full Flamethrower exactly where Lapras was.

Likewise, Lapras drew back, and blew an extra strong Bubblebeam through the foggy arena. Water sprayed everywhere as the beam met the fire, equalling in strength. It was now a matter of who could hold out the longest.

Even now, the Mist made ever difficult to see where the attacks were going. Ash was gritting his teeth to such an extent that he may possibly have began digging into their enamel. Meanwhile, Blaize was secretly crossing her fingers. Obviously, this was the hardest battle she had faced during her career.

And still, the two Pokémon battled all out against their opponents, doing everything they could to make their trainers pleased. Finally, Flareon was the one who, since had already searched with Flamethrower, fainted first. However, Lapras was also out some few seconds after.

"Two down, one to go…" Misty muttered, "be careful Ash."

_Hmmm_... _Misty must be really close to Ash. She's really worried._

"What's up?" Tails asked.

"Here comes Blaize's strongest Pokémon, Tails. It'll be a real toughie for Ash this round." she replied grimly.

Blaize sent out her final Pokémon, Camerupt.

"What is that?" asked Ash, in disbelief.

"This," grinned Blaize, "is a newly discovered Pokémon from Hoenn. Meet Camerupt, the only Fire and Ground type Pokémon in the world!"

Ash was now unable to use Pikachu, as Camerupt was also a Ground type. He had no Water types left, he couldn't use Ground's other weakness, Grass, because Grass' main weakness was Fire. You could say Ash was in a very macabre situation. Or as Ash said himself, he was "screwed". He thought heavily for a few minutes, then decided.

"Go, Bulbasaur!" Ash shouted. The grass type appeared on the arena.

Camerupt began shooting embers at Bulbasaur. Swiftly dodging them, he used the sun to his advantage and charged up a quick-fire Solarbeam. It hit Camerupt spot on, but its Ground element was cancelled out slightly by the Fire element. Camerupt was nonetheless shaken from the blow, but still steady on with alternating Embers and Flamethrowers. Bulbasaur charged up another Solarbeam, hitting Camerupt side-on. The blast sent it reeling, staggering for balance. The heavy creature tumbled around, hit by short Solarbeam projectiles. Finally, against all odds, it managed to compose itself.

"Oh, man, almost had it then," groaned Ash, who was sweating abundantly. He noticed the referee who had only recently arrived at the scene.

"Markus! You're late! Where've you been?"

"Sorry, Miss, I had to finish my lunch."

"Indeed," Blaize muttered coldly.

The two Pokémon continuously battled each other with monotonous repetition too redundant to rectify (bad alliteration, I know). Then suddenly, Camerupt simply collapsed on the ground.

"Three, two, one; Camerupt is unable to fight. The winner is by default – sorry, I didn't catch your name?"

"Ash," he replied hurriedly.

"The winner is Ash!" he yelled, raising a green flag.

"All right!" cried Ash joyfully, punching the air. He approached Blaize, who was nursing Camerupt.

"Is it… okay?" Ash asked.

"No, I don't think so. Markus! Call an ambulance from the Center, now!"

At the sound of a medical emergency, Tracey went into doctor-mode, running to the injured Pokemon. He rapidly checked its pulse, breathing rate, airways, muscles and every other part of the Pokémon anatomy, before concluding:

"It appears Camerupt has had a heart attack," he announced, before beginning CPR. Fortunately, the ambulance had arrived by then and Camerupt had special attention.

"Well battled, Ash. Sorry we didn't get to finish it properly. I'll see you another time perhaps." complimented Blaize, handing him the Magma Badge, before running to the departing ambulance.


	7. Team Australia: Search and Rescue

Answering a question by some guy ( ), Sonic was (as I mentioned) already exhausted when he arrived in the clearing, and I, as the author, assumed that the Spin Attack he used on the net would have drained the last of his energy (you try running at Mach 2 around an island all day). Also, keep an Australian slang dictionary handy (they're all over the net).

* * *

Jessie dusted off her hands. 

"There. That should do it," she said, looking at the unconscious Sonic with disgust. "That little rodent will have learned his lesson. That is, if he wakes up!"

She laughed coldly before sauntering off with James and Meowth in her wake.

As the unconscious, poisoned and grievously injured Sonic lay here, his death became imminent. Were it not for the Samaritanship shown by two passers-by, it would have been most certain.

They were both male adolescents, one older than the other. Both were clad in board shorts and sun visors. One of them, the shorter of the two, had fiery red-brown spiked hair, while the other's was jet black, but also spiky.

If you were to see them normally, the shorter would dress in green and yellow slacks, and matching green jacket. Of course, in the midday sun, not even the nerdiest of humans wore long trousers or the like.

It was, indeed, Richie.

"Holy smokes! Oi, Brock! Take a look at this bloke over 'ere! Looks as mangled as anything! What d'you reckon? Croc attack?"

Albeit with a very Australian accent.

Brock laughed heartily for a few seconds before his face became serious.

"No; I daresay this is but the devious work of none other than Team Rocket themselves!" he concluded very melodramatically.

Richie sighed. "Jeez, it was just a bloody joke, Brock! We should probably take him to the Sentah."

Brock nodded and attempted to ease Sonic into a Pokéball, but it was simply repelled, like two magnets with the same pole.

The two boys improvised by preparing a makeshift stretcher and hoisting Sonic to safety from his otherwise certain death. They quickly made heading for the Pokémon Center.

* * *

Tails followed the gang down back towards the Pokémon Center, who in turn were following Ash, who had been eternally gloating over his probably slightly unfair win. They channeled all of Ash's comments away from their ears and chatted together.

"The next gym's somewhere far away from here," commented Tracey.

"How are we getting there, then?" asked Tails, inquisitively.

"Um, well I was going to suggest cutting down all our luxuries and save for a flight there-"

Tails' eyes lit up. "You have aeroplanes on Earth?" he asked excitedly.

Tracey paused. "Yeah. Do you know what they are?"

"Do I ever! Dude, it's like the only thing I've been missing since I got here!"

Ash also paused, finally noticing nobody was listening to his dramatically supersized description of the previous battle.

"Can you fly planes, Tails?" he asked.

"Yeah!" replied Tails excitedly.

Tracey hesitated. "Well, you see, Tails, you don't actually get to _fly t_he plane."

"Why not?" demanded Tails, who had just had his dream shattered.

"Well… not everyone on Earth can fly an aeroplane."

"What, so it flies itself does it?"

"No, airlines hire pilots to fly the planes for everyone else."

"Oh…" replied Tails, thoroughly disappointed.

"I'm sure you'll have fun anyway," said Tracey, making a poor attempt at cheering up Tails.

Tails shrugged. "It doesn't matter, really. You can't win all the time."

Now at the Center, Brock and Richie summoned the assistance of Nurse Joy.

"'Scuse us, nurse," called Richie, "We got a badly injured Pokémon here. At least, I think it's a Pokémon."

Joy came to the service desk from the operating room. One glance at Sonic had her bustling everywhere; typing, calling for assistance, activating code blue, the whole lot.

Richie blinked. "Well, there's service for ya," he said as an army of Chanseys swarmed the stretcher that now contained Sonic. Joy took Sonic's stretcher briskly to the ICU.

Life is not fair, especially in this case, because at that precise moment, Tails and his group walked in. Had they been one second earlier, they would have seen Sonic, and the result would be a catastrophous calamity so colossal it would cause a collapse in the composition's cause. And also give the author a writer's block as solid the Earth itself.

They did see Brock and Richie however; they were on their way out.

"Richie! How you doin' mate?" called Ash, after giving his Pokéballs to an assistant Chansey.

"Pretty good, mate, and yourself?"

"Couldn't be better! Just won a Gym Badge. By the way, what happened to your voice?"

"Work experience in Australia," Richie grinned, "I swear it does stuff to ya."

"Oh, righto then," said Ash, imitating Richie's natural dialect.

Brock had meanwhile been recounting his past six months to Misty. Tails joined the group, whereby Richie noticed him.

"And who's this little fella?" he indirectly asked Tails.

"Um, Tails," he replied.

Richie, obviously not expecting a reply in English, was surprised.

"A talking Pokémon?"

"I'm not a Pokémon!" sighed Tails irritably.

"Well, what are ya then?"

"A Mobian Fox,"

"Where's Mobia?"

"It's called Mobius, and from here I've absolutely no idea where it is."

"Oh, right. So how'd you get here?"

"Long story," muttered Tails.

"We've got plenty of time,"

"Well, back on Mobius, I've had loads of friends. We were just doing our thing and one week I just kept screwing up, and then this girl called Sally started getting really annoyed. We had this fight, and then I tried to hurt her, and my best friend Sonic intervened, and hit me in the cheek. Then I ran off and my friend Knuckles came. He said everything would be okay, so I went back to my place then Sonic said he was sorry and he would help out until my cheek healed. When he went home I heard something outside and went to check it out. It was this cool red power ring, so I took it inside, and fell asleep with. I had a nightmare and when I woke up, I was here. I had a look around, then Gary came, and started fighting me with his Pokémon, then Ash came and started fighting me as well. Then he started fighting Gary's Pokémon and they battled. Some policewoman came and told Gary off, and I stuck with Misty and Ash and Tracey."

"Right, so let's get this straight. You was all hunky-dory on Mobius, then one week, you started screwing up, so this sheila Sally comes and spits the dummy on ya; you try and belt her one, and this dude Sonic comes and drills you in the face. You go off somewhere and this bloke Knuckles comes and cheers you up, then you go back to your place, and Sonic comes and says he's sorry, and he'll help. He goes off somewhere and you check out some red power ring. You go to bed with, have a nightmare, and wake up here. You take a look around and then that dero Gary comes along. He battles you, then Ash, then Officer Jenny gets the shits on him, so he goes off and you're with Ash and Company now?"

Tails nodded, not sure what he was agreeing to.

"So, where were your oldies, er, parents?"

Tails glanced at the sky, but didn't say anything.

"Oh, right," said Richie, falling silent.


	8. The Discussion of Fiscal Management

Tails and his crew continued walking to nowhere. They had since decided to allow Richie and Brock to return and join them, and were now busy discussing a means of affording air travel.

"Well, don't look at me," said Tails bluntly, "I haven't got any _dollars_." He annunciated dollars like a child pronouncing a particularly difficult word.

"Wouldn't it be nice," commented Ash, "if every time you won a battle, you got prize money? I'd be really rich, and we could easily buy first class tickets to Celadon or something."

"Yeah… and not some crappy twelve inch economy seat," dreamed Tracey.

"Get real, guys," interrupted Misty, "A first class seat for one costs about the same as ten coach class seats, so I elect coach class. That should cost about a thousand."

"Now where are we gonna get a coach class ticket?" asked Brock sarcastically.

"Ha, ha. A grand shouldn't be too hard to save up. We'll cut back on luxuries and pool our money. I have thirty dollars. How much do you guys have?"

"Fifty bucks," Tracey offered.

"Nineteen dollars and twenty-five cents," put in Brock.

"15¢," said a rather sheepish Ash.

"I got a twenty on me, but I've about 135 in savings," said Richie.

"Well, nothing on me, but so far we've got 254.40." calculated Tails. "Which leaves us with 745.60 to go."

Richie and Brock stared.

"Shoot! Tails, you machine! How'd you work that out?" asked Richie, amazed.

Tails shrugged. "It came naturally. I've always been good at technical work."

Brock teased. "Hey, Tails. If the perpindicular of a triangle is 14.76 and the area is 50.184, what's the base?"

"6.8," said Tails, puzzled. "Why?"

"You psycho…" Brock shook his head in total amazement. "I guess I'll just take your word on that one."

Tails shrugged, looking rather puzzled.

"Why were you at the Pokémon Centre, Richie?" he asked.

"Oh, we found this screwed Pokémon at the side of the road. Poor bastard. He was in a right state, eh, Brock?"

"Fair dinkum, mate, I swear it was like he had a night out with the boys or somethin'. Kinda feel sorry for him, but. He's gonna wake up and he hasn't got a brass razoo. Some guys must have mugged him."

"Why would anyone mug a Pokémon?" asked Tails, shocked.

"Nicking' something, maybe." offered Richie, shrugging his soldiers. "Frankly, I'm surprised he was still alive when got there – must be built like brick-shit house if you ask me."

"I reckon," agreed Brock, "Who could've bashed up the poor fella. What kind of Pokémon was he?"

"Actually, now you say it, I dunno. Blue spines, runners, and gloves. Pretty advanced if you ask me, for a Pokémon."

"That wasn't a Pokémon," said Tails, shaking his head disbelievingly.

Richie laughed. "Well, what was it then, mate? Couldn't be someone from Mobius, I'll give you that. Someone you've met before?"

"Definitely…" Tails replied, almost trance-like.

"Well, spill it buddy. Who is it?"

"I – I think it's Sonic."

"Who in the blazes of fiery Hell is Sonic?"

"Friend of mine back at Mobius,"

"Well, how'd he get here then?"

"Trust me, Richie, if I knew the answer I'd tell you."

Meanwhile, Ash, Tracey and Misty watched with great interest.

"So, let me get this straight," confirmed Ash, rather confused, "This dude Sonic was your friend back on Mobius. Now you're here on Earth and your friend Sonic is on Earth too?"

Tails nodded – it was pretty simple.

"Nope, still nothin'," sighed Ash.

Tails was about to explain it again but Brock interrupted.

"Well, are you going to wait for him?"

It hit Tails like a ton of bricks. If Sonic found him, he might try to take him back to Mobius – somewhere he really wasn't in the mood to be now. But what everyone think of him when he said "No, let's just keep going,"? Tails sincerely didn't want to leave, but he still wanted Sonic to be around. And what would they think of Sonic? After all, it was he who had wounded his face – and questions were bound to be asked.

"Woo hoo, Tails? You still here?"

"Huh? What? What's happening?"

"Nothing, buddy, you've just been thinking a bloody long time."

"Well, after all that thinking, you must've decided if we'll wait or not." reminded Brock, unnecessarily.

"Um… to be honest with you guys, I really don't know. Do you want another straggler?"

"Whoa there, kid. Let's get something straight." said Brock. "One: We don't consider anybody in our group a straggler, and Two: The more the merrier!"

"Well, I dunno…"

"Excellent! Then we'll wait for our new friend Sonic!" cried out Ash, rather prematurely.

"Hey, I didn't say -"

But it was too late. The decision was already made. Tails now regretted not saying "No", because a feeling of humiliation was bound to occur when Sonic walked out of that Pokémon Centre, he realised.

He felt dreadful. But, the damage was done, and Ash and Company turned and headed back to the Centre.

Sonic woke up very dizzy. The room swam around in his head. He could just make out other beds and white walls, before lapsing back into unconsciousness.


	9. To Celadon!

Sonic's mind stirred. His eyes remained closed, but he grew conscious of voices around him. He could hear regular beeping in his right ear, presumably a cardio-rate oscilloscope. He also heard muffled talking from adjacent rooms, and finally, the door of his unit opening as Nurse Joy entered the room.

"As you can see, doctor, this Pokémon is like none other I've seen before. I kept him on a general anaesthetic until you arrived because of course I can't operate if I don't know my way around his body." she said.

"Well, he seems to be coming conscious, by the looks of his electroencephalogram. Please hand me the anaesthetic repository,"

At this, Sonic opened his eyes and leapt out of bed.

"No, don't worry at all, I'm fine, doctor, there's no need for a repository thank you." he said hurriedly.

The doctor was amazed. "At talking Pokémon? An intelligent one, obviously. I'd probably complain too if I knew a needle was going in my -"

"Thank you, doctor, let's not go into details," said Nurse Joy, "If the Pokémon wants to leave, let it, there's no microchip so it's clearly wild. Off you go, spikeball, be free!"

Sonic sprinted out of the room with images of a needle in his behind motivating him. He ran so distractedly that he rammed straight into a another person who was walking through the door. The Sonic-innocent victim combo rolled about ten meters out the doorway, and when the dust finally settled, Sonic saw the person he had foolishly run into in proper detail.

"Tails!" he cried, "It's you! You're safe!"

"Sonic? Hey there, buddy! Say, could you lay of my chest there? It's kind of hard to breathe."

"Sure thing, I'm just glad you're okay,"

"I'm fine, don't worry, my friends were really kind to me."

It was then that the friends moved closer to the pile of Sonic and Tails.

"Sonic, these are my friends Ash, who plans to be a Pokémon Master; Misty, who used to run a gym; Richie and Brock, a couple of Aussie no-hopers who are tagging along; and Tracey - strange guy who likes to practice personas – today he's an aristocrat."

"I say, what a pleasure it is to meet you, Sonic!" said a very pompous Tracey. Sonic accepted Tracey's vigourous handshake while holding back laughter as he visually imagined Tracey in a tuxedo with a monocle and a cup of tea.

Tails cleared his throat loudly. "Well, Sonic, we were just planning to go somewhere on a trip, and I suppose you're coming with us?"

Sonic laughed, as though it were a joke. "Of course not, Tails, you gumby! We're leaving this place as soon as we can! Look, Overlanders everywhere! Two of them even tried to kill me! I just woke in that strange building, I dunno how I got there."

"Well, that was us, if you don't mind we would appreciate a little credit, thank you." said Brock, clearing his throat loudly.

"Oh? Well...thanks then - the nurse seemed to work wonders for me. She keeps calling me a Pokey-mon or something. What is that?"

Everyone put in their own explanation instantaneously. Through muddled talking, Sonic seemed to get the picture.

"Oh, I see. Well, I'll be sure to tell Amy about this amazing biological discovery when we go home. Come on Tails, let's hit the road!"

"Um, Sonic?"

"Yeah?"

"Do you have any educated idea of where to go?"

"Of course not!" replied Sonic cheerfully.

"Well, where are you taking me?"

"Home, that's where,"

"And I suppose you know how we're getting there,"

"Not a clue,"

"Well, then I'm staying with these guys. I'd love to come, but it doesn't take a genius to know not to follow someone nowhere."

Sonic looked hurt. "Admittedly, I don't know where I'm going, but I certainly know what my priorities are, and I'd love to go home at the moment."

"Well, I've decided to called this place home," said Tails, "so I guess you'll have to stay here if you're staying with me."

"What's wrong, Tails? We made up in Knothole, remember? I'll talk to Sally and make sure she's extra nice."

"Sonic, don't you get it? We're stuck here! What was the last thing you did before you woke up?"

Sonic blushed slightly. "Uh, I prayed to this weird red power ring that you would be safe and I could know where you are."

"Well - oh, uh, I'm flattered but um, the point is that the red power ring is what made us warp to this place. Clearly it is composed of a very rare element, that made us transport here through quantum possibility."

"Please explain."

"Well, quantum physics dictates that material objects, like atoms, can be in two places at the one time. They are only stationary when they are observed. Or something. I don't know, but I reckon that's why we're here. As far as quantum physics is concerned, we stuck here until further notice. Besides, if you go off on your own, those two Overlanders might come back and hurt you again, so you're better off with us."

"Yeah, I agree," said Sonic, defeated.

"We're going to the airport tomorrow, going to join?"

Sonic agreed.

* * *

The next day the troupe gathered their things and found their way to the airport. It was busy, but they checked-in and passed through security without issue. Then they were through to the gates, whereby Tails gleefully ran to the window to marvel at the extraordinary machines parked at the airbridges outside.

"Wow, they're amazing!" he said excitedly. "And so large! The X Tornado is a third of the size of that one there, the Boeing 737, and even that's smaller than some of the others! I'd love to fly one."

Like a child with a new toy, he stared outside, captivated by the aircraft moving about outside for at least half and hour.

"Passengers travelling on Air Pokémon flight AP1317 to Celadon City can now commence boarding at Gate 14 thank you." came a monotonous announcement from a nearby PA speaker.

A large group of people shuffled toward the gate. Two assistants gradually boarded the passengers and soon the group were walking down the airbridge. Tails was thrilled, though he became somewhat downhearted when he saw that it was unlikely he would see much from his seat. Nevertheless, he sat next to the window and resumed staring at the activity surrounding the aircraft.

There was a muffled snap as the doors were closed and an announcement crackled over the PA.

"Ladies and gentlemen, welcome aboard Air Pokémon flight AP1317 to Celadon City. For your safety, please pay full attention to the AV screen nearest to you. We are now showing a brief video to ensure you are fully aware of the safety procedures in the unlikely event of an emergency."

The ceiling-mounted televisions clicked on and the safety announcement played all the way through. At this point, the aircraft hadn't moved yet. After several minutes Tails began to grow impatient.

"Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen this is your captain Clarence Johns speaking, and joining me today is co-pilot Justin van Dasch. Sorry about the delay at the moment, we're just waiting for clearance from the control tower. Uhhh, we're looking at a flight time today of about two and a half hours...weather for Celadon at the moment is pretty poor, a cold front is moving in so we're expecting some rain and wind and there could be a few bumpy patches on approach this afternoon. Other than that, we have clear skies most of the way, and we'll be talking to you later today, thank you and have a pleasant flight."

The PA clicked off. Two minutes later, there was a faint bump and the aircraft moved back slowly. There was a high pitched whine and a low grumble as the engines were started. From the window, Tails could see the wing surfaces moving as the ailerons, spoilers, slats and flaps were tested. The aircraft stopped moving back, and after a twenty-second delay began moving again, only this time forward. The taxi was only short and soon the aircraft was on the runway, lining up.

"Cabin crew seated for takeoff."

The engines whined in a crescendo, then the powerplants roared fiercely and the aircraft was rolling down the tarmac. 25 seconds later, they were in the air.

* * *

"Ladies and gentlemen, the captain has switched off the seatbelt sign. At this time please feel free to move about the cabin. However, it is recommended for your safety that when seated you keep your seatbelt comfortably fastened. We will be showing today's film _Spider Man 2_ in a few minutes. In addition, we also have a range of audio channels for your enjoyment. Please listen using the headsets which are being passed out by cabin crew. Thank you, and have a pleasant flight."

"Awesome, I love that movie!" said Ash, delightedly, enthusiastically tearing the plastic wrapper off his headphones.

Misty decided to watch it too, but Tails declined, and took the opportunity to talk to Sonic about everything that had happened since he had arrived.

Twenty minutes later, the cabin crew served lunch. Fruit salad, a choice of drink, a bread roll with condiments, and a choice of either a chicken and lentil pie or Hokkien noodles with soy sauce and Chinese vegetables. However, it was their catering for Pokémon which proved to be problematic.

"And for the Pokémon," said the smiling air hostess.

"Um, chicken and lentil pie, please." interrupted Tails, who obviously thought the air hostess was giving him a choice.

"Wow, a talking Pokémon! Well, sorry, but you have to have the special meal like the others." she replied.

"I object! I'm not a Pokémon, they'll vouch for me." argued Tails, indictating Ash and Misty.

After brief debating on Tails' behalf, he finally got his way and received the pie he ordered.

"Well worth it." he said, his mouth full of pie. "It's delicious."

Misty sighed and began her Hokkien noodles.

* * *

**One hour later, in the cockpit.**

Clarence first had signs of a headache as they passed 18000 feet. By the time they had reached cruise altitude, it had escalated into a migraine.

"Clarence, are you okay?" asked Justin, who had noticed his discomfort.

"Yeah, I'm fin-" Clarence Johns never finished that sentence. He simply collapsed all over the panel. Immediately, Justin was out of his seat and putting Clarence against the wall in recovery position while the autopilot handled the flying. He was about to call the air traffic contollers when he too crumpled to the floor, banging the door on the way down.

* * *

**A few seconds beforehand...**

Finished with his food, Tails had an idea. He would pretend to go to the toilet and instead have a sneak peek at the cockpit. They might even invite him in and give him a turn.

He unbuckled his seatbelt and made his way past Sonic and Misty to the front of the aircraft. As he approached the toilet door he heard a muffled thump. He pulled the cockpit door open slightly, and saw what would horrify any other passenger. An aircraft cockpit with two unconscious pilots on the floor.

Tails ran to the co-pilot's side, forgetting to close the door behind him. He propped the man against a wall and sat in the pilot's seat, marvelling the controls.

* * *

**Ten minutes later...**

"Hey, Sonic, I'm gonna check on Tails, he's been in the toilet for ten minutes now." said Misty

"Righto," came an automatic reply from behind the in-flight magazine.

Misty got up and walked to the toilet. Seeing the green "VACANT" sign, she was confused. Her eyes caught the cockpit door, slightly ajar.

"Oh no," she muttered to herself, "please no..."

She peered into the cockpit and saw something even more horrifying than she expected - two unconscious pilots propped against the cockpit wall and Tails in the pilot's seat. She hurriedly stepped inside and closed the door behind her.

Tails turned to see what the noise was.

"Oh, hey Misty. This is pretty cool doncha think?"

"Tails! What did you do? You know you'll be taken away for hijacking if someone finds out?"

"I found them like that, Misty. Please, you think I knocked them out or something?"

Misty didn't answer.

"Oh, come on. Would I do that just to fly a plane?"

Again, Misty didn't answer.

Tails rolled his eyes. "Why wouldn't you believe me?"

"Of course I believe you Tails, don't be ridiculous. It's what everyone else is going to think that I'm worried about."

"Don't worry. I've got it all sorted out. I'll fly this to Celadon and no one will ever know."

"Tails, can you fly this plane and land it?"

"Surely, you can't be serious!"

"I am serious, and don't call me Shirley."

"Ha, ha. But seriously, I am perfectly capable of handling this aircraft safely."

"Well, I certainly hope so, because from what I see, we're all doomed otherwise."

It was an unfortunate bout of timing that at that moment Sylvia the air hostess opened the door with lunch for the pilots, whom she assumed were still flying the aircraft. Screamimg at the predicament in the cockpit, she attracted the attention of all the passengers.

"The plane has be hijacked," she shrieked, "by a Pokémon!"

Of course, the whole cabin promptly erupted with cries and screams.

"We're all doomed!" one man cried, "A Pokémon can't fly a plane!"

* * *

"Right, where's the autopilot on this thing?" muttered Tails to himself, scanning the infinitely complicated instrument panel.

"Tails, I thought you could fly an aeroplane." remarked Misty, warily.

"Jeez Misty, the planes I've flown before had one engine. This plane has two engines."

Misty raised an eyebrow. "So?"

"This plane also has complicated avionics. With one minor exception, aircraft I'm used to had four gauges. Fuel, altitude, speed, and attitude. This plane has about 400 gauges. Nowhere on my plane was there an 'Exhaust Gas Temperature' gauge or a 'Right Electrics Bus" switch, and clearly this 'Approach Chart' meant something to the pilots." explained Tails, indicating a wafer thin piece of paper covered in numbers, lines and diagrams.

Misty couldn't help but smile. "Okay I see your point. But can you still fly it?"

"Yeah, but whether I can do it without anyone noticing is a different matter."

"How do you mean?"

"Well, see this radio? There's a control centre watching us. If they see me doing anything odd, then we're in deep water. No doubt there are rules about 'safe' flight, so we'd better be sure before we try anything on that lot," said Tails, this time indicating the passengers.

"What's your idea?"

"Well, going along the line of pretending to be terrorists, I propose that we say if they don't shut up we'll punish them by bouncing the plane around."

"Whatever. Sounds fine to me. How do you plan to tell them?"

"When I find an intercom button. I know there is one because they used it at the beginning. Can you help me find it?"

Misty agreed and turned reluctantly to scan the instrument panel.

After about five minutes of vigilant searching, Misty was the successor in locating the intercom button, which turned out to be convieniently located next to the seatbelt sign.

"Passengers, this is your hijacker. Please stop screaming or I'll lose concentration and we'll start crashing until you be quiet."

Tails waited patiently for about ten seconds, then spoke again, "Well, I warned you".

"Now what, Tails?"

"I'll shake the plane a little bit. Just help me find the autopilot switch."

"Tails!"

"Hey, I'm just kidding," Tails smiled, "I've already found it."

He switch off the button and took hold of the yoke. Memories flooded back to him, and let instinct do the work.

* * *

"Woohoooo! This is something else, innit Misty?"

Misty, who was gripping her seat, finally managed to yell "Stop! They've shut up!"

Tails obliged, and stopped the semi-aerobatics.

"Air Pokémon 1317, you are off your expected course, is everything alright?"

"Oh, shit." cursed Tails. "We'd better improvise."

"Whatever you say, Captain."

The pair waited in silence.

"Air Pokémon 1317, please acknowledge."

When the second request for acknowledgement came, Tails turned down the radio and spoke to Misty.

"Your go!" he smiled gleefully, dishing off his responsibility in the matter.

"Um...hello? This is Air Pokémon 1317. Our pilots are unconscious, we've just got a passenger to take control of the plane." she said, deciding to be honest.

"Oh...okay. Standby 1317."


	10. There's a Party in this Cockpit!

"Hey Misty, I'm getting pretty lonely here, aren't you? Maybe we should get the others up here too, I suppose they'll want to know what's going on."

Misty thought for a moment. "Well, I suppose we could, but how?"

"Why don't you be creative?" replied Tails.

"Attention passengers, we would like to inform the travelers in Row 26 have been chosen randomly to accompany us in the cabin."

A murmur rose throughout the cabin. Gradually, people's heads turned towards the unlucky people in Row 26.

"Um, guys, I think we should go now." said Tracey.

"Bloody oath, mate, or we're history. Come on, before we attract too much attention" replied Brock, oblivious to the eyes staring at them.

The group of them slowly got up and walked what seemed to be miles to the cockpit door and knocked.

* * *

Misty waited. There. Three knocks.

She rose from her seat and slowly opened the door. Brock, Tracey, Richie, Ash, Sonic. Five people, good.

She shut the door, locking it behind her.

"Hi guys," she said cheerfully.

Expletives found their way around the cockpit as the scene was taken in.

"What the Hell, Misty? You killed two pilots and now you want us? You psycho!" gasped Ash.

"Oh yeah. I killed them. Now I'm going to kill you." came her sarcastic reply.

"Thanks, I feel great now,"

"We didn't do it," said Misty, "Do I look like the harmful type?"

"..."

"Don't answer that," she said sheepishly. "But seriously, they were like that when I got here. I thought Tails had done it."

Heads turned towards Tails.

"Well don't look at me," said Tails, who had joined the group, "How could I take those two out and not make a fuss of it?"

"A fair point," remarked Tracey.

"Well what's wrong with them, then?" asked Richie, "They look about as lively as a pair of boulders sitting next to each other."

"I don't know," replied Tails. "They don't appear to be injured, so I'm thinking internal problems, like stroke or something."

"Okay, now what?" said Ash, changing the subject abruptly, for no apparent reason.

"Well, I'm supposed to be flying the plane to Celadon and landing it there. Of course, not as easy as you think, you look out that window and tell me where you think you are."

Brock looked out. "Just water everywhere,"

"Exactly. I've also no idea how I'm supposed to make an approach. Back on Mobius, after a while I learned where all the hills and things where around my runway, so I knew how high I should be when I was a certain distance away."

"Well, why is it different here?" asked Ash.

"On Mobius, it took me about a year to memorize heights and things, and I judged distance with my eyes. Here, I've no idea where I am, how many hills there are, how high they may be, what course I'm supposed to follow, and there's only one thing that will tell me all of that, and that's this."

Tails picked up a clipboard with a few wafer-thin, almost translucent pieces of paper marked "Approach Plates – XKCL".

"Let's see," said Tracey.

He looked at it. The paper was mainly a diagram, a map, with a bird's-eye view of Celadon Airport. It was completely covered in lines and dots.

"Hey, what does 'Missed Approach: Climb to 2000 via KCL course to D6.0 IBFI ILS/CLD VOR M97' mean?"

"What did I tell you? All the terrain, heights and things are on there, and I don't even know which way's up!"

"Well maybe the controllers will make it easy because they think you're a novice," suggested Misty.

"Hopefully." added Tails. "Otherwise, we're screwed."

He looked towards the cockpit again, scanning for any clear anomalies. He sighed, trying to relieve the stress he had been placed under so suddenly. His brain constantly tried to think of ways they could handle the situation, but none of them would work unless they knew how to land the aeroplane properly.

_So we need to remove that restriction_, Tails concluded, silently.

"Okay, we need to get the controllers to tell us how to land - Tracey, take this." handing the radio to Tracey.

"So what do I say?" he enquired, confused.

Tails scribbled some words onto some spare paper.

"Right, here we go. Orange Center, this is Air Pokémon 1317 requesting full vectors for a visual approach to the Celadon active. We have an approach chart but we can't read it. Altitude is 33000, airspeed indicating 290, over."

"Very good," remarked Tails, "but you need to hold down the 'COMM' button first."

"Oh," Tracey said, rather embarrassed, before repeating the message.

"Air Pokémon 1317, understood. Expect vectors for runway 17. First vector in 24 minutes, acknowledgement not required. Transponder 7700."

"Well, that's done." said Tails, swiping his hands together as though they were covered in dust.

"How did you know what to say, Tails?" asked Misty.

"I picked stuff up as we went. Vectors mean directions, active is the runway they're using at Celadon, and they need to know our height and airspeed to work out when they need to start giving us instructions."

"What about the transponder bit?"

"I think that's this," Tails said, pointing towards a device on the radio stack. "I'm not sure what purpose it serves, but it says 'Transponder', I'm guessing that's what they're talking about. I've set to 7700 already."

"You're the boss."

The team sat idly for twenty-four minutes and, right on cue, came the first vector.

"1317, descend 24000 feet, turn right heading 300."

"I'll handle the flying, Tracey, you get on the radio. Just confirm everything they say."

Tracey nodded and picked up the radio. Disengaging the autopilot, Tails sat down in the pilot's seat, taking up the control yoke and turning it gradually.

_This is easy as anything_, he thought, _hydraulic power, most likely. _He brought the plane out of the turn and pointed the nose down slightly. The altimeter dropped safely to the target altitude.

Continuing on with ATC instructions, Tails soon had the plane over mountains, then cities.

He had followed instuctions from the checklist which Brock had found by accident while trying to recover a lost Smartie.

It was soon time to begin the approach.

* * *

In the baggage hold of Air Pokémon 1317...

"Ha! That's that done then!" exclaimed Jessie triumphantly. "Our plan is working!"

"What plan, Jessie? I hope you're not being secretive again." muttered James in reply.

"Of course I'm not fool! I'm telling you about it right now, aren't I?"

James sighed.

"Anyway, here's what I did. First of all, you'll be wondering why I signed us all up at this Airport Starbucks, then quit the same day. It's because it's imperative for our plan!" Jessie explained delightedly.

"Using the Internet café at the airport I managed, with my superb hacking skills, to download a roster for Air Pokémon. I got photos of the two pilots flying the twerp's plane today, then when they ordered coffee here – which they always do- I spiked their drinks! They'll fall asleep mid-flight, headaches maybe, and when the plane lands there'll be so much commotion that the twerps won't notice we've stolen that Pikachu!"

Jessie laughed maniacally for a few seconds before James interrupted.

"Well, I have three comments."

"Do tell,"

"Whatever. I notice that your plan seems very reliant on the twerp's arriving at the airport. Now, if both of the pilots are asleep, how will the plane land?"

Jessie's face twitched slightly.

"Which leads me to the second point, what if the plane goes down? Everyone will surely die, even us! I don't think I can handle that concept. I'm not that...bad."

"What about that blue Pokémon you agreed to torture?" asked Jessie, annoyed.

"You _still _haven't got me the _Muscle_ magazine you promised me. And even so, I have another point to make. If you have such good hacking skills, why didn't you hack into a bank account and get rich that way?"

Jessie exploded in a fit of rage.

"How dare you show me up!" she screamed, "Why did you say anything! Always trying to outsmart you are, telling me something obvious that I missed accidentally!"

She drew a massive animé-style mallet and moved in on James, who was cowering behind a bag of golf clubs and a surfboard..

"Please, Jessie, I didn't mean to hurt your feelings, I just thought I'd tell my thoughts on your plan!"

Alas, James' apology was met with a lump on his head which would remain for a few days, at least.

* * *

"Air Pokémon 1317, the airport is straight ahead, you're cleared for a priority visual approach onto runway 17, descend and maintain 3500 feet until runway is sighted. Report visual on runway 17."

"Well, this is it guys, that's our clearance. We can take as long as we want, we have the priority for a visual." briefed Tails. He took the plane down and held it straight in the wind. The aircraft buffeted with increasing intensity in turbulence.

"Tracey, I can see the runway – just. Let the center know please."

Indeed, it was a miracle that Tails could see anything. A cold front had moved into Celadon, and there was heavy rain, turbulence and a visibility of about half a mile. Theoretically, Tails shouldn't be seeing anything, nor should he be flying a visual approach, but these were different circumstances; foxes have better night and poor-visibility vision than humans.

"Where? I can't see it, Tails." said Misty, worriedly.

"Can you not? Well, I can, don't worry about a thing, I can handle this." he said, setting the flaps to 30 degrees.

The plane hit a strong air pocket, heard obviously by some members in the cockpit.

"Whoa, Tails, you all right?" asked Brock, who looked slightly queasy. "This bouncing around is not so good for lunch."

"I'm doing the best I can, please just let me concentrate for a second?" pleaded Tails, who was wrestling with yoke and throttle. "And can somebody let the passengers know they're going to be okay, if they wear seatbelts and keep quiet?"

Another gust came by swept the plane off course. Anyone except Tails wouldn't have noticed; the visibility had been downgraded from poor to fog.

Tails was clearly having a hard enough time as it was. The wind was coming from every direction and was buffeting the plane everywhere. In the background, the engines could be heard whining and spooling as Tails fought to maintain a safe speed.

He grabbed the gear lever and extended the wheels, then quickly set the flaps to "FULL". The plane hit another air pocket and once again Tails fought with the controls. They were getting closer to the ground...

A computer voice kicked in and jumped everybody.

"100 feet above,"

"Here we go, this is all or nothing." muttered Tails.

The runway lights just appeared and miraculously the plane was still in its general direction. It was zooming closer both below and in front of the plane.

In slow motion to everyone's perspective, Tails eased of the throttle, still fighting against gusts. The runway was getting closer by the millisecond. Tails pulled back on the control yoke ever so slightly, and added that little bit of thrust.

Misty shut her eyes. Ash braced himself. Brock strapped himself to the jumpseat. Richie grabbed the nearest rigid object, and Tracey waited, sick-in-the-stomach.

Thump.

The rear wheels slammed onto the ground, shaking and rattling the plane. Tails eased the nose gear onto the runway, while extending the spoilers and applying reverse thrust and brakes. The plane skidded from side to side, but slowing down, nonetheless.

They had made it.


	11. A Night in the Cells

"Air Pokémon 1317 taxi to gate Tango12 via taxiways Alpha-4-Sierra, Sierra-3, Papa-1, Papa-2, Papa-13-Whiskey, Whiskey, Delta, Foxtrot-2, over." called the ground control.

Tracey exchanged a nervous glance with Tails.

"I don't think they know we aren't the real pilots," said Tracey.

"No kidding, here, let me have the headset for a moment, please." replied a sweaty Tails.

"Celadon Ground, Air Pokémon 1317 is holding on Alpha-4-Sierra, closest apron space as possible is preferred due to medical emergency."

Tails smiled as he concluded the totally improvised request.

"I'm getting pretty good at improvising, doncha think?"

Everyone nodded automatically.

"You're way skilled, Tails, I never knew you were so versatile," complimented Sonic.

Tails blushed at the comment.

"Thanks, Sonic. I'm really sorry everyone for sneaking in here. I shouldn't have, it was like an impulsive and irrational thing to do -"

"Hey, dude, you like, saved our lives. Who cares if we'll get arrested for hijacking, we'd've died if you hadn't stepped in." interrupted Ash.

"Well, actually, Ash, I do care if we get arrested for hijacking. What was the point in coming this far if we end up in jail straight away?" said Misty, slightly agitated.

"Don't worry Misty, we'll find a way out of this," reassured Brock.

"Air Pokémon 1317, cleared to the North apron, follow the nearest northbound taxiway."

Tails manoeuvred the mighty aircraft along the network of taxiways that surrounded the busy airport. Eventually he reached a strip of pavement with a sign, "N APRON". He stopped the plane in a vacant section and after a few minutes found the fuel cutoff switches. With engines shutting down in their characteristic whine, an audible cheer was heard from the cabin.

"Hallelujah!" one cried. "The Lord be praised, for He has spared our lives from the hands of Satan!"

Several members in the cockpit raised their eyebrows but proceeded to open the door.

The flight attendant shrieked when tapped on the back by Misty, who jumped.

"Sorry if I startled you. Is it possible to open to open these doors so that we can get those two sick pilots to an ambulance?"

The stewardess agreed wholeheartedly, opening the doors to see a fleet of ambulances, a police car, a pair of mobile stairs and several buses in the fog.

"Up here, officers!" called the flight attendant over the sound of the aircraft. Two burly men in blue rushed up the mobile stairs.

"What happened here, miss?" one asked.

"Well, I'm not sure, but apparently the two pilots on the plane are unconscious, and for how long they haven't been flying is a mystery to everyone except that girl and that Pokémon." explained the stewardess, indicating Misty and Tails, who backed away.

"Alright, you two, come with me."

"Can the others come too?" asked Tails.

The officer was confused at the talking Pokémon, though he didn't show it.

"Whatever. Winston will take them in the other patrol car."

Winston, a muscular individual with pectorals that left wrestlers with something to be desired, escorted the remaining party down the stairs, making way for the team of ambulance officers hurrying up the stairs.

* * *

In the patrol car, Misty and Tails sat in the back, listening in to the cop radio. It was mostly babble about pursuing a speeding car but one item caught Misty's interest very quickly. 

"Celadon base, this is Airport Patrol 7, over."

"Go ahead, Airport Patrol 7."

"We've inspected the aircraft that had the emergency landing, we found two suspicious members in the hold. I've got them in custody, we're bringing them to base, over."

"Ten four Airport Patrol 7, Celadon base, out."

* * *

"Right, you two, get in there!" growled the security guard at Celadon base, pushing the pair into a grimy jail cell.

"I can't believe that we're going to be prosecuted!" cried Misty. "We saved their lives, for God's sake!"

"What are you whining about, twerp?" came a familiar voice from a nearby cell.

"Jessie? What are you doing here?"

"Long story, but basically we were stowaways on a plane and we got caught."

"I hope Giovanni bails us out." said James woefully.

"So it was you who the cops were talking about on the radio! Why were you stowing away?"

"Should we tell her, James? I think my plan has failed enough, don't you?"

"Whatever, I'm just trying not to slip into mindless depression."

"Well, the plan was to steal your buddy's Pikachu by causing a kerfuffle on the aeroplane, and taking it when there was a commotion on the ground, but as you can see it didn't work. I overlooked the fact that drugging the two pilots would mean inevitable death."

"WHAT? You idiot! You could've killed us and everyone else on that plane, including yourselves!"

"I know," Jessie replied, shaking her head defeatedly.

"In fact, the only reason we're alive is because Tails was able to land the plane."

Tails, who was in deep conversation with Meowth about who-knows-what, looked up at the sound of his nickname.

"What is it?"

"I was just saying how you saved all our lives."

Tails smiled, blushing. "Oh, thanks. I don't normally save the day much, that was more Sonic's area."

"Hey, Tails, why can you talk? Not many Pokémon can talk."

"Because I'm not a Pokémon, that's why. Don't ask what I am, I don't feel like explaining again."

Jessie shrugged. "Anyway Misty I was just wondering if could borrow that magazine of yours if you're finished with it. I really need to get the latest in fashion."

"Me too," agreed James wholeheartedly.

"Why are you being so nice?" asked Misty.

"Oh, we're not on our shift any more, so we don't have to worry about capturing you or anything." said James, as though dismissing the idea of capturing someone.

Misty looked puzzled, but agreed to let Jessie read her magazine. It was awkward, indeed, having a civilised conversation with their enemies, but they weren't deceptive at all.

"Hate to interrupt this tea party, but the super wants to see all of you upstairs."


	12. Bland Monotonous Office Block

Hello to everyone! I thank my loyal readers for waiting so long to read this. For a while I lost interest in this fic – at one stage I was ready to pass the 'rights' to the story on, but the other day I read the reviews and it stirred me into thinking. I can't leave you waiting to see what happens! So then, I wrote. Now, it's been a long time since the last chapter, so my writing style may be different, and perhaps some parts may be out of canon – if anyone notices this please let me know in a review. Thanks!

* * *

With a _clunk_ the cell doors were unlocked and a fierce looking woman in a police uniform ushered Tails and Misty upstairs, past doors and desks. Phones rang in the background and the odd person would greet the officer as they passed.

The came to a door marked plainly as 'Superintendent'. The woman knocked.

"Come in," came a curt reply.

The woman opened the door, showed the pair inside and left.

The superintendent was quite obviously a respected man. He was well into his fifties, with thinning white hair and a stocky figure. A thick but trimmed moustache completed his face. He removed his glasses and indicated for the pair to sit down.

"Now, I realise that you come from a disadvantaged family, but this is the ninth time you have been caught using a Pokémon to shoplift, an offence under the _Lawful Use of Pokémon Act 1955_, according to this report. It is not acceptable and never has been," he began.

Misty interrupted. "Superintended, we didn't shoplift. We're the two who landed the plane today,"

The superintendent raised his eyebrows. "Really? You're very young, I'd have to say. Forgive me for generalizing, but I was expecting someone older and perhaps male to have saved the day."

Tails spoke up. "I am male!"

"The Pokémon landed the plane?" asked the man, rather bewildered.

Tails nodded, then added, "But I'm not a Pokémon,"

The superintendent rubbed his eyes. "I'm very grateful for what you did today. However bizarre it sounds, if what you are saying is true, then you have saved the lives of at least 150 people, a commendable effort, to say the least,"

Tails smiled.

"However, you have both committed a major offence under the _Air Transport Safety Act 2002_ and must serve a minimum sentence of eight years in a state prison, extendable to up to 15 years as decided by a judge and jury in two weeks from now. Until then you will be held in custody here without bail."

Tails' and Misty's jaws dropped.

"You're not serious are you?"

The superintendent chuckled. "No I'm not. You're free to go. I can't say the same for your pals though. I'm very sorry about the inconvenience we caused you today. Now, please, I have matters to attend to."

He showed them to the door.

"Thank you once again for your deeds today. You truly are heroes."

And he closed the door.

"Well, now what?" asked Tails.

Misty shrugged and looked around. "I'm not even sure how to get out of this place."

So they explored, hoping to find a sign that would lead them to the exit.

"Well, there's plenty to see around here," remarked Tails as they passed _Administration 4F._

"Celadon City is one of the biggest in all of Kanto," explained Misty, " - nope, not this way – so I suppose this place reflects that."

They stopped at a sign.

"Okay… so we are in the… Riarachán Block at the moment…" observed Misty. "There's a cafeteria not too far away. Let's sit there for a while and rest."

"That's cool, I'm starving anyway," Tails admitted sheepishly. They set off.

Misty smiled. "I hope you don't mind me saying, but you're really really cute."

"What?"

"You are! You're just adorable! But I suppose you're used to hearing that."

"No, actually. Back on Mobius I got nothing but prejudice from everyone but my friends, for having two tails. And none of my mates ever complimented me…and if they did it was because I was clever in some way or another. But no one has ever said a thing about me being cute."

"Really? That's weird. Most people on Earth would love someone like you…well…as a pet I suppose."

Tails gave a look.

"I don't mean offence by that! I see you much higher than that, I'm just saying…"

"It's okay, it's okay."

The conversation continued as the pair made their way towards the café, doubling-back a few times in the process. Eventually, they came to a rather unexciting restaurant.

"I suppose an administration block wouldn't need to cater for visitors too often," said Misty, as though making an excuse for the bland looking eatery, aptly named _Cafeteria_.

They walked in and looked around. Two women sat in a corner, sharing a piece of a cake. Another man, sitting in the middle, was just starting on a baked potato. Tails' stomach grumbled. He bit his lip, hiding an embarrassed smile.

"Um…shall we find a place to sit?" he suggested, hoping Misty hadn't heard him.

Misty, who had heard him, agreed. They sat and ordered, and talked. Their food arrived. Tucking in to his club sandwich, Tails asked Misty if there was any way of contacting the others.

"Oh yeah! I forgot…my mobile phone should get some reception upstairs. I'll try Ash after tea."

* * *

Well, how did you like? Let me know! Review please! Constructive criticism is more than welcome. 


	13. Giant Interconnected Police Station

The Nokia Tune rang.

"Quick! Pick it up, it might be Misty," said Tracey. Ash answered the phone.

"Hello? Oh hey Misty. How are you? Yeah we're fine…no I haven't. I'm not sure. No not yet. Okay I'll tell them. See ya."

"Well?"

"She's out of the cell now, she wants us to go over to the cafeteria where they are. The admin block apparently."

"Where's that?"

Ash shrugged. A few of the group sighed and they looked about for an indication of where they were. They had been dropped off at the police station, a vast nexus of monolithic buildings that would have been better named the 'Police District'. Having no idea where to find Tails and Misty (the other patrol car had taken another route which led to another area of the station), nor what to do until the two had been released for that matter, they had decided instead to explore the adjacent surroundings, given that the weather had improved briefly.

After some looking around, the group unanimously decided they had no idea where they were.

"This map is useless!" cried Richie, "I don't care what is good to eat here - I want to know where the bloody cop station is!"

Aggravated, he threw out his hand, wishing for something to hit. By chance, a taxi mistook the gesture and pulled up by them.

"Where you looking to go?" asked the driver through the window.

Richie looked to the group, watching for approval. Seeing no protest, he replied. "Eh, Police Station thanks, mate."

"No problem, hop in."

The five of them squeezed into the back of the sedan. The driver, who slickly pulled away and proceeded to skilfully manoeuvre about corners and back-roads, was in all areas a much better taxi driver than Al, who had made the experience terrifying. Ten or so minutes later, he stopped outside the familiar complex that was the police station.

"Cheers mate," thanked Richie, handing the driver the contents of his wallet.

Dodging a patrol car, they jaywalked, perhaps foolishly so, across the road. As they climbed the ornate pebblecrete steps towards the equally elaborate façade, the sheer size of even the initial concourse became apparent. As they entered, a squad of Hitmonlee approached and swiftly checked them with hand-held metal detectors. Having being permitted entry, they looked around and were rather taken aback by what they saw. The lobby could have been described as a fusion of the check-in areas in large airports and the foyers in deluxe hotels. Hallways forked off away from the vast area in every direction, and police officers travelled from place to place on electric carts, which occasionally passed in front of the group.

Overwhelmed by the activity, they moved somewhat subconsciously towards a central fountain, which featured a comfortable seating area.

"God, you wouldn't realise you were surrounded by cops in the place," commented Brock, impressed, "but I'd have to say, it's gonna be hard finding Misty and Tails here."

He wasn't exaggerating. Full-length windows that looked out into the complex revealed that a full road network existed under the building, weaving in and out of sight. The other end of the station was visible in the distance.

"Well, does anyone have any suggestions about where to start?" asked Ash, sparking action.

"How about asking someone over there?" suggested Sonic, in a tone that somewhat implied the answer was clear in the first place, as he gestured towards a fittingly extensive information area.

Tracey laughed. 'Yeah, that's kind of a no-brainer."

They walked over. A woman who resembled Officer Jenny looked up from behind a myriad of computers and other electronics.

"Can I help you?" she asked politely.

"Err, yes. Two of our friends were arrested and released this afternoon and we'd like to meet up with them now." Tracey replied.

"Do you know where they are?"

"Um, not exactly, but when we heard from them about twenty minutes ago they were eating."

"Okay, I'll just bring up some CCTV feeds from our cafeterias. Just watch the screen behind me and tell me to stop if you see your friends,"

She turned to her keyboard and in a flurry of keystrokes an image of a kitchen appeared on the monitor behind her. After about ten different views they started to lose hope but suddenly they saw a glimpse of a tail.

"Wait, stop there."

"Is that them?"

"Maybe. Can we move the camera?"

"Of course. Take this."

She handed a joystick-like controller to Tracey who was able to get a slightly better look.

"Yeah, that's definitely them,"

"Okay, not a problem. We'll get you over there in a moment," the clerk said brightly.

She swivelled on her chair again, to face a radio stack. Picking up a handset and flicking a few switches, she called for a shuttle. A minute later a golf cart, minus the roof, pulled up next to them.

"Earl, take them over to the café in Foxtrot-Four-Romeo." She instructed, in a disturbingly different tone to the one with which she had conversed beforehand. Earl nodded and set off quickly.

Unsurprisingly, at this stage, the areas after the entrance hall were very complicated. Corridors forked off in all directions, both left and right and up and down. Elaborate signs hung from the ceiling which perhaps gave an indication of where to go but it was very clear that once you got lost you would be hard-pressed finding your way out.

Weaving left and right, the scenery changed and it soon became clear that they were moving through an administration block. The hallways were painted white and had a rather plain carpet. The bland look was only occasionally interrupted by a window or pot plant.

After more navigating through the maze of corridors the cart finally came to a stop outside a suitably blandly-decorated restaurant.

"Guys!" came a delighted cry from behind a corner. Misty appeared looking very relieved. "We thought you'd got lost."

Richie opened his mouth but Ash interrupted. "Us? Lost? Never! What do you take us for?"

"Well, I didn't think you'd know where to come. Guess I was wrong," she answered, smiling.

"Do you guys want a lift back to the lobby?" asked Earl.

"Yes, please!"

They all hopped on and set off once again. Misty and Tails spoke about the superintendent and everything that had happened.

When they came to the foyer again they sat around the fountain and decided what to do.

"Well, it's been a really big day – I think we should just relax here for a few days and recuperate," suggested Misty.

"Yeah. Ash can see the gym leader anytime, we should just relax and see the sights for a while," agreed Brock.

Ash didn't bother protesting. "Okay then. So where's the hotel?"

* * *

"How about this place?" suggested Richie, as they walked past a motel.

"It'll have to do. It's getting dark." said Brock. They headed in.

The motel was a cosy looking place, though it initially resembled the waiting rooms of dental surgeries. A man behind a counter looked up.

"You guys want a room?"

"Yeah, please."

"Follow me. Welcome to Celadon Hotel. Unfortunately, you just missed dinner, but we'll put you up for breakfast tomorrow morning as part of the service. There's a bunch of restaurants down the road if you're hungry. You can eat out in the garden if you like – there's a nice walk through there and it leads onto a reserve. Anyway, this is your room, make yourselves comfortable. Just ask me if there's anything you want. I'll be back in an hour or so with a key and bill."

He showed them in and returned to his work. Their room was pretty decent – large with three bunk-beds that gave ample sleeping space.

"This is great! But I'm starving." said Ash.

"Yeah me too," a few of the others agreed.

"What do you want for dinner?" Misty asked Sonic and Tails.

"Oh, we're happy with anything."

"Ok, well you two stick around for your man to come back and we'll get some food," she said.

"Fine,"

Richie, Misty, Brock, Tracey and Ash left in search of the restaurant district the owner had told them of.

"Uh hey Sonic? I'm gonna go for a walk out the back. Coming?"

"Nah I'd better wait here for that guy to come. Thanks anyway. Don't be too long."

"Ok I won't."

Tails left and headed towards the garden. It was nice - very neat and smelling of newly bloomed flowers. The sun was just setting and the storm earlier had cleared, leaving a beautiful atmosphere. Strolling into the nature reserve, he passed couples making the most of the romantic setting, people walking their pets, and the odd wild Pokémon rustling in a bush somewhere.

Finding a vacant bench, he sat to watch the sun set. It was staining the heavens a deep orange, with hints of purple towards the top of the sky. Thinking, Tails drifted into a state of mild meditation.

Suddenly, his peace was disturbed by a shout.

"You again! Well, if it isn't Mr. Smart-Ass Pokémon. This time, I will catch you!"

Startled, Tails turned in time to see Gary, and his Arcanine lunging straight at him.


	14. Amping Up

Time for the next instalment. And please keep reviewing people!!! By the way, this chapter is written in Tails' POV again. And also, in response to a review I got sometime last year (lol), I'm not going to try and keep any sort of canon with the series, largely because I stopped watching it after the Kanto season. So I'll just use Pokémon I'm aware that Ash has/had and if it doesn't match well it doesn't really matter does it? (the answer is no)

* * *

Instinct was the first reaction my body made and I swiftly sprung to the side of the Arcanine's charge. This merely aggravated it, to my dismay, and I was forced to dodge a jet of molten flame that singed the grass where I had just been standing.

I was overcome by a strange feeling. My heart pounding on adrenalin, I quickly analysed the nearby environment. But this time, it wasn't for a safe place to hide. I wanted to fight. Leaping into the air, I tried a spin-attack on Arcanine. It worked, but it didn't phase the Pokémon at all.

_Time for a different strategy._ I spun my tails as fast as I could and made a rapid ascent, to about twenty metres. With a birds-eye view of the park I was able to pinpoint an ideal place to experiment with a new attack. I strategically took advantage of the dusky sky and found some airspace where I knew the Pokémon wouldn't be able to see me, though I would be able see to it.

I had to avoid some frustrated spurts of flame as the Arcanine tried to seek me out. I didn't have much time. The fire had given away my position.

Heart pounding and breathing fast, I mustered up all my courage and energy. Reversing the direction of my tails, I propelled myself towards the ground, and the Arcanine. It happened in slow motion – the Arcanine's surprised expression; the wind buffeting my face; Sally's spiteful remarks swirling around in the back of my head, beating down my self-confidence; the blue flash pushing the Arcanine out of my path. And then – black.

* * *

Groaning, I opened my eyes slowly. My head was resting on a cushion, and I was lying on my couch. The room was silent. _It was just a nightmare! A nightmare about Pokémon and inter-universal travel. Or was it a dream and not a nightmare?_

Slowly, I rolled over, impeded by an injury of some description.

"Aagh!" I yelped as a bright yellow face gazed up at me curiously. Startled by the cry, it jumped back. It was Pikachu. I was still on Earth.

"Pika pika pika, pika pika?" said the little mouse.

"Sorry, what?" I said, shaking sleep out of my head and trying to listen.

"_You've woken up. How are you feeling?_" came the repeated reply.

"Oh… sore. Sore and tired. Where is everybody?"

Pikachu shrugged. "_I was asleep when they left. I doubt they'll be gone long. That was some fall last night._"

"What?"

"_Don't you remember? Oh, you might be concussed. Well you fell from quite a height. Or at least, that's what it looked like."_

**(A/N: For those who haven't copped-on yet, Pikachu is still speaking Pokémon-language, but Tails can understand what he is saying)**

"Oh yeah! I remember. No I wasn't falling. I was trying to dive-bomb Gary's Arcanine. I think Sonic attacked the Arcanine first though. Because I missed."

I sighed. "He never gives me a chance to fight for myself."

"_I know what you mean. Sometimes I feel like Ash is like that. Very overprotective."_

Pikachu waddled over to the television in the corner and pulled the power cord out of the back.

"What are you doing?" I asked, sitting up.

"_Um…do you promise not to tell?"_

"Sure. Why not?"

"_Watch,_"

Pikachu bit at the cord until the plastic insulation frayed off. Grounding himself with his tail, he pulled at the wires until there were two strands about ten centimetres long. He then placed the wires over his red cheeks and lifted his tail. It was curious to see. Having worked with electricity, I expected Pikachu to writhe around on the floor in agony as 240 volts of power electrocuted him. I was wrong.

"_Oh dude – you have no idea how good this shit is,_" he said, sounding very contented. "_I don't get to do this very often. Are you electric?_"

"Um… what?"

"_Can you… like… spark other Pokémon and stuff?_"

"Oh… no I can't,"

"_Shame… I'd share some of this with ya but since you aren't an electric type you'd probably just die._"

I couldn't help but laugh at how casually Pikachu had said this.

"_Don't tell Ash or anyone else either. This is between you and me right?_"

"Yeah of course,"

"_Right, that'll do,_" Pikachu decided, and grounding himself again he, with professional speed, reattached the power cord to its owner, hiding any evidence of it being tampered with. "_Um… so anyway… if you don't mind me asking…what are you?"_

I was astonished. "I… uh… I'm a fox?"

"_I figured. What kind of Pokémon are you? Don't tell me you're one of those Hoenn folk. I can't stand them. Sanctimonious lot if you've ever seen some._"

I had no idea what he was talking about. I must have made a look, because Pikachu smacked himself on the head.

"_You're from Hoenn, aren't you?" _Pikachu said, looking abashed, "_I _always_ do this. Let a word slip here or there and BAM I've offended someone-"_

I laughed. "Chill. I'm not a Pokémon. Didn't you hear me explaining that to the other guys the other day?"

"_Nah, I don't listen to what they talk about. Takes too much effort to understand. They just assume I'm proficient in English. Selfish indeed. Anyways, you're speaking like a Pokémon now, so I just thought you were a Pokémon._"

What? I was speaking like a Pokémon? Surely he must be joking. "Really?"

"_Yeah! If I couldn't tell you to keep your mouth shut about amping myself up then I wouldn't have tried it. Didn't you know you could speak to Pokémon?"_

"Well… no I never really tried. I mean I've only been here a week or so,"

"_Weird. Well, why don't you meet some of the others?_" Pikachu went over to where Ash's Pokéballs were, and pressed a few. In a flash of light, Bulbasaur appeared, along with Pidgeot.

"_Where's Squirtle?_"

From the pile, I could hear muffled cursing.

"_Doesn't want to wake up, I suppose,_" remarked Bulbasaur. "_What do you want?_"

"_I want you guys to meet Tails._" Pikachu replied.

"_Where's the point in that?_" Bulbasaur argued, "_What, are we supposed to speak to him or something?_"

"_Yes… I have to say I rather agree with Bulbasaur. You are well aware, Pikachu, that neither of us can speak English correctly. So why would you introduce to us to him? Cuckoo!_"agreed Pidgeot, who had been preening herself.

"Um… according to Pikachu I can speak to Pokémon." I interjected, rather awkwardly.

Pidgeot choked on one of her feathers as she heard this, and Bulbasaur's mouth hit the floor. For a moment there was silence, then profuse apologising.

"_Good heavens! I'm terribly sorry! Goodness me…_" Pidgeot continued on in a similarly posh manner, whilst Bulbasaur generally looked rather embarrassed.

It was an awkward moment all around. Eventually Pikachu took it upon himself to introduce them.

"_So…Tails, this is Bulbasaur. He's a Grass-type, so generally he likes to be a dick to anyone else," _he joked, "_and this is Pidgeot. She's a Flying-type. Quite a posh lot, really. Except the base evolutions. They sounds like scull'ry maids, doncha fink, Guvna?_" Pikachu imitated the accent.

I laughed, but Pidgeot was less than impressed. "_Oh, and I suppose Electric-types are high-class? I've yet to meet one who can resist destroying expensive electronics for their… ahem… personal use!_"

Bulbasaur, who had been silent, agreed and poked Pikachu with his vines, taunting him for a reaction. At the moment, several more balls opened and Richie's Pikachu, Sparky, appeared, joined by his Charmander and Ash's Squirtle.

"_Yo man, wat up?_" asked Sparky as he hi-fived Pikachu.

Squirtle rolled his eyes. "_I heard you guys talking. If you think base Flying-types are bad, you have proof right there –_" Squirtle indicated Pikachu and Sparky, who were in the process of a lengthy hi-five-cum-secret-handshake, "_that Zippo is an idiot._"

He cackled incessantly until Zippo the Charmander smacked him on the head.

"_Shut up you! Everyone knows that Water-types are by far the most arrogant Pokémon!_"

"_Yeah, well even humans know that Fire-types have the worst tempers!"_

I watched in amazement as a shouting fest of which "type" was best ensued. Taunts and cries filled the room as each Pokémon defended themselves while simultaneously insulting someone else.

At that moment, the door opened, and Ash and the crew entered.

"That was a lovely breakf- hey, look, the Pokémon are playing together! Aren't they cute?"

I couldn't help but sigh at how wrong Ash was.

* * *

REVIEW PLEASE! Constructive criticisms and the like. 


	15. A New Plan

Hearing Tails' sigh, eyes turned towards the sofa.

"Tails! You're okay!" cried Misty. "What happened last night?"

Tails rubbed his eyes groggily. "I'm…not really sure. I was fighting with a Pokémon I think…"

"Whose?"

Tails groaned and racked his brains. "Gordon? Glen? Something like that. Gary! That was it. I can't remember much though…"

This was a lie. Tails could remember everything in crystal-clear detail. In particular, he couldn't help but replay the blue flash that was Sonic coming to his 'rescue'. It had just cost him a nasty bump on the head. _I guess he was just looking out for me. That's what friends do._

"You poor thing," soothed Misty, almost condescendingly, "We brought you some breakfast for when you woke up. Sorry, I didn't think we should get you anything hot in case you didn't wake before it cooled down."

Tails thanked her and ate slowly, trying to ignore an omnipresent headache he could feel forming in his skull.

Why did Sonic have to be so overprotective? I'm eight years old now…and I can quite easily fend for myself I think. He treats me like I don't know what I'm doing! He doesn't know any better – neither of us even knows where this place is…

"Tails?" asked a voice. "Tails are you awake?"

Ugh.

"Oh thank goodness! You've been out cold for twenty minutes now! The others have gone to get the Nurse."

Misty's concerned face blurred into vision as Tails' eyes opened slowly and focused.

"What is _wrong_ with me?" he asked, with an air of desperation and irritation, and rubbing his head gingerly. "That fall must have messed me up pretty bad."

Misty looked confused. "Tails…are you okay?"

He considered it. "No."

And then he was sick.

* * *

"That's right Nurse. He was just speaking this gibberish and then he threw up everywhere. He's not well at all."

Misty and Nurse Joy continued the conversation while the rest of the group listened with great concern. Their Pokémon were having a different conversation.

"_Those imbeciles!_" cried Togepi in exasperation. "_Doesn't she realize Tails was speaking Pokémon?_"

"_No,_" noted Sparky, glancing at the humans babbling away.

Pikachu smacked him. "_Thanks, Sparky, for pointing out the blatantly obvious. The point is someone needs to tell our trainers so that they don't think he's like, high on acid or something._"

"_Or electricity,_" added Pidgeotto, disapprovingly.

Sparky and Pikachu ignored her and changed the subject.

"_Is Tails okay, anyway?_"

"_I don't know. They carried him away on a stretcher so he probably passed out again,_"

"_Poor guy,_" noted Sparky_, "Hasn't really had the best run for luck has he?_"

The Pokémon continued talking about Tails and eventually the topic of telling their trainers Tails could speak Pokémon came up.

"_We have to tell them. They think he's going insane!_"

"_Maybe he is," _added Squirtle, cynically.

"_Well, how are we gonna do it? They won't believe Tails – they'll just think he's having a delusion. And it's not like we can tell them – humans won't listen to us._"

"_Besides, there aren't any Pokémon that can talk to humans except…Meowth._"

The reality of it dawned on the Pokémon very quickly.

"_Meowth can tell them! They'll listen to him more than anybody!_"

"_Um, hello? Remember, just for a small second, who Meowth is and what he does!_"

"_Look, if you have better suggestions, I'm open to them,_"

It was a good rebuttal.

"_Okay, you're right there, but still. How are we going to get him to do it? Walk up to him and say 'Excuse me, Meowth, but we were wondering if you could do us a really important favour, considering we're buddies and all'? No. Team Rocket will surely ask for something in return, and I'll give a cookie to anyone who guesses what._"

Pikachu sighed. "_Not another one of those 'give you yourself in like the heroic Pokémon you are' things again! It's so cliché! Besides, I'm hardly worth their time. I'm nothing special at all._"

"_We know that!_" said Sparky, with a sly grin. Pikachu smacked him again.

"_Shut up you. Anyway, I still think we should come up with a better plan, or at least expand on this one. 'Surrender to Team Rocket' is a little vague._"

Unfortunately, they never got to, because their trainers recalled them into their balls and set off with the Nurse back to the Pokémon Centre.

* * *

"What could be wrong doctor?" asked Ash as the group hurried down the corridor in Celadon Pokémon Centre.

"Well, to be honest I have no idea. Since Tails is a new type of Pokémon and I haven't even seen him yet I can't even make a guess." replied that doctor.

"Oh…will you be able to fix him up though?"

The doctor looked confused. "Didn't I just explain –"

Misty interrupted. "Just ignore him…he's…not all there."

"Hey –"

"Here we are!" said the nurse, quickly diffusing the impending argument and glaring angrily at the pair. The doctor looked Tails up and down.

"Good Lord!" he exclaimed, "This monitor is broken! Joy, please see to it that it be replaced as soon as possible."

Tails' friends sighed, relieved that the news did not pertain to the fox. The doctor was now closely examining the bruising on Tails' head, and scribbling fiercely onto a chart.

"Any idea what the matter is?" Misty asked the doctor, who was now writing so fast that the words must have been merely wavy lines on the paper.

"Yes… there's no ink in this pen! Joy, please see to it that the all the pens in this hospital are replaced as soon as possible."

"Uh…I meant with Tails,"

"Oh! No, he will need to have an X-ray and most probably an echoencephalograph to supplement that before I can make any professional judgement regarding his health – although I can guarantee he certainly isn't his normal self."

"Yes…we figured."

"Anyway, we will take care of things from here. Oh, can I ask – what type of Pokémon is Tails?"

Several mouths opened to speak but no sound came out as they realized that they didn't have an answer.

"Errr…" Misty was the first to speak. "We're not sure. We found him injured a few weeks ago. He could speak English and he decided to follow us…but none of us have actually caught him. So he could leave if he wanted. Or I suppose he could be someone else's Pokémon! We never thought to use a Pokédex on him. Actually…"

Ash read Misty's mind and opened the machine, pointing it at the unconscious Tails. The screen scanned repeatedly, blinked several times and finally gave a response.

"Could not identify species using EMGR. Seek assistance error 1217S."

"Strange…ever seen that before, doctor?" asked Ash, showing the man the display.

"Hmmm…not specifically. But I can tell you that EMGR stands for electromagnetic gene radiation."

Seeing the curious looks around the room, he continued. "Well, it's a curious phenomenon that occurs about some types of life in the world. It's not very well understood at all, except by Pokéball craftsmen and a few Pokémon professors. I can't tell you very much…all I've read about it in medical journals is that Pokémon and some other life forms emit a special type of ultra-small wavelength radiation that contains information about the genes of whatever gave it off. So, for instance, your Pikachu is at the moment giving off waves of EMGR with fragments of information about his DNA in it. I presume your Pokédex works by scanning for EMGR and then matching it with known waveforms."

Brock rubbed his head. "Wow man, that's _so _confusing!"

"It is – at the moment that is essentially all we know of it. Professor Oak built your Pokédex, I presume?"

Ash nodded.

"I thought as much. Oak is possibly the most erudite researcher in the field alive today. You would never know it; he is much smarter than he makes himself across to be. He would be the only person to talk to about it. The craftsmen of Pokéballs probably also possess great amounts of knowledge about EMGR because that is in theory why a ball will catch a wild Pokémon but not one that has been caught already, or something that doesn't have Pokémon traces on it. A person, for instance. But these craftsmen refuse to talk to any researchers about what they know – it is strictly a family kept secret."

Ash thought for a moment, absorbing all the information. "I think I'll call the Professor now. It could be very important."

"Alright, but please do it in the foyer, away from the patients. I will take Tails for an X-ray now."

Walking out to the lobby with the others, Ash took out his mobile phone, dialed Oak's Laboratory, and put it on speakerphone.

"Hello?"

"Hi, Professor! It's me, Ash."

"Oh, hello there. The usual Pokédex evaluation, I suppose?"

"Actually…ah no. Not today thanks. But I am having problems with my Pokédex, now that you say it."

"Oh?"

"Yeah…I was using it on a Pokémon today, and it scanned for ages and then said 'Error 1217S'. It's never happened before."

The Professor's reply sounded quite flustered. "Uh…um…hmmm. I've no idea Ash. I didn't program these errors into the Pokédex you know." Oak gave a nervous-sounding chuckle. "Perhaps you pointed the sensor the wrong direction or something. The 'dex won't return anything if you point it at a tree or anything like that."

"But Professor –"

"What? Hello? Ash, you're breaking up – hello? Hello?"

And then he hung up. Misty spoke.

"Is anyone else a little suspicious about that performance?"

A few heads nodded.

"I've got full reception here," noted Ash, waving his phone around in the air, "I don't think the line was breaking."

"No…he might be right though Ash. If you didn't point the sensor directly at Tails the Pokédex probably tried to work out what kind of Pokémon his bedside table was."

"We shall see…" muttered Ash, and pointed the sensor at a pot plant sitting in the corner of the room. Once again, the Pokédex scanned meticulously and returned the same error.

Richie groaned. "Ash, you buffoon! You didn't point the Pokédex at the right thing. Thanks to your ridiculous lack of motor co-ordination, you just wasted fifteen minutes of our time!"

"Shut up, Richie," replied Ash, defensively. "It still doesn't explain why Oak was so odd when we brought it up. I think something fishy might be going on."

"You probably just caught him at a bad time," suggested Misty, "there's no use making a mystery out of nothing."

"I suppose not," sighed Ash, moving to shut the door of his Pokédex.

"Wait!" cried Tracey. "Look at the screen again."

They did; it was blank.

"Get that error back up again,"

Ash did so. The message returned to the screen again.

"What is Tracey? It's the same – 1217S."

"No, look closely at it."

Immediately, the eyes stared at the screen.

"Wait…that isn't an S…it's a five!"

Sure enough, the message read, "Could not identify species using EMGR. Seek assistance error 12175." The message font made the two characters almost indistinguishable.

"Right, that's it. Oak was definitely hiding something." Ash concluded, "There's no way two errors the same would have different numbers. I'm getting the feeling that we aren't supposed to know about that 1217S thing."

"Totally…"

"Think about it. Normally if you point at the wrong thing it gives you the 'five' error. But when we pointed it at Tails, it gave us the exact same message, but the error code was subtly changed. Only reason they would do that is if there were things that needed special classification that only certain people were to know about."

"Yeah! So they made the error codes almost the same so if someone happens upon it they wouldn't really notice! You're onto something Ash," said Misty.

"Thanks, Misty," Ash replied, giving her a smile. "But who else is there that we can test it on? Has anyone seen Sonic, actually?"

"Come to think of it…no. He's been gone since last night." Tracey said.

"Where'd he go?"

* * *

Sonic was breathing very hard and his heart was pounding. Ten hours ago he had suddenly become completely terrified of something. And for the last ten hours he had been trying to escape from that something.

He looked around into the dark. Complete terror filled his body. A chilling breeze lightly rustled the leaf litter in the forest he had been running through. A feeling of utter dread rose inside. He felt possessed to look and see what he had been chased by.

Slowly, he turned his head. Sonic screamed, and ran for his life.

There was nothing there.

* * *

_In Oak's Laboratory…_

Samuel Oak put the phone down. "Oh dear."

He hurried into his lab room, walked over to a panel adorned with buttons of all colours and labels with many complicated names. He pressed a diamond-shaped button, half-red and half-blue. A green fingerprint sensor glowed next to it, waiting for him to press his thumb onto the device. He did. Then he sighed, and hurried to his car, leaving a note on the bench for the maid, "Gone to important meeting. Do not try and contact me. Money is in the cupboard under the cutlery drawer."

* * *

_A boat dock, about two hours later…_

Professor Oak walked up to a shack on the pier, manned by a greasy looking man with fearsome muscle tone.

"I would like to rent a seven horsepower boat for me and my poodle, named Schmuck," he said.

The man gave a look. "Dude, what the hell are you talking about?"

"Oops. It must be my aging mind."

The man's face changed abruptly, to a very serious one.

"Welcome, Samuel. The others have already arrived. Hurry."

The two men walked briskly and quickly down the pier to a luxurious-looking yacht. They stepped aboard and walked towards the cabin. Ensuring no one had followed them, they shut the door and locked it.

There were about five other people already in the room, looking grave and sitting around a beautiful cedar dining table.

"Good afternoon to you, Professor. Something to drink?" came a greeting. From behind a bar, Giovanni, head of Team Rocket, emerged wearing a Hawaiian shirt and holding a bottle of a colourful mixer.

"No, thank you Giovanni. I really am in a hurry."

"I should hope so," snorted a younger man at the table. Though he was at most twenty-five, his face looked terribly aged, possibly from frowning a lot.

Oak ignored him. "The reason why I pressed the Button is because I believe that we might be on the verge of getting discovered."

Another man, known as Kurt, spoke up. "What makes you think this?" he asked very seriously.

"Just earlier today I received a phone call from a trainer that uses my Pokédex. He said that he was using it and it gave a 1217S error."

The faces in the room looked blank.

"When I programmed the Pokédex, I had to program it to recognize Transfers too, so I'd know if I found one. The error code the Pokédex gives if it detects a Transfer is 1217S; it looks almost the same as the error it gives if you point it at a bush or something, so people wouldn't think anything of it." Oak explained.

"Oh dear. Does the trainer know about the Transfers?"

"I tried to put him off the track. But this guy is pretty determined. I don't think it's long before he realizes that there are two messages. Then he will call again."

"Who is it?"

"Ash Ketchum and his friends,"

"Ah, no problems!" said Giovanni dismissively. "I can have them killed easily."

"Giovanni, please! If you could be serious for a moment - I'm sure you will have noticed that the wave is peaking again."

"Naturally,"

"Well, it's only a matter of time before Ash gets the Transfer error again, and he will begin to suspect something. And he will come to me for advice. What can I tell him? Not the truth. And there is little else to explain why there would be two subtly different error codes for what is technically the same thing."

Kurt stroked his goatee. "Oak is right. Can we afford to tell them the truth?"

The younger man spoke again. "I agree with Rocketman. Just kill them."

"Ivan, I hope you know that if you ever refer to me as Rocketman again, I will have you destroyed just as I suggested we do to those trainers. Insofar that we are aware, you know of the Transfers only for your insatiable curiosity for the Pokédex that Oak is again having a problem with. Thus, you are of no use to us, and in any case, I will be glad to have you sliced up and fed to my Persian. So, for your own good, shut up." came Giovanni's ice cool reply.

Ivan did not try and speak again.

"We may have to tell them a little of how things really work, to satisfy them," said Oak, "hopefully Ash will be content with knowing more about EMGR. If he asks questions, I will say that is all I know."

"Fine. So why did you need to call us here?" asked Kurt.

"Well, as I said before, the wave is peaking again – the first time since twenty-four years ago. Transfers will be everywhere."

"They are anyway!"

"Of course, but even more so for the next few weeks than any other time for another two decades. Most of you do not know about the odd things which happen around this time."

Giovanni signaled for him to continue explaining.

"You all know the idea behind Transfers. The EMGR of some little critters vibrate in consonance with the wave. If the wave is on a down, then our little friends get beamed here from anywhere else in the universe if they come close to the right stimulus. If it's on an up, something here gets sent far away."

"We know that already, get to the point," groaned Kurt.

"Well anyway, the wave is just bottoming out on the down now. The EMGR of other life will be ringing in consonance most at this time than any other. So there will be a lot of strange life to be found, if you look carefully."

"Not…aliens or anything?" asked Ivan, with a hint of worry in his voice.

"Of course not, you stupid boy!" said Giovanni, "As far as we know, Pokémon DNA emits EMGR and that's it. Only things you'll be seeing on Earth will be life with Pokémon genes in them."

"Ahem," Oak cleared his throat, "as I was saying, there will be a lot of Transfers on Earth for the next month. Beware of them. Most will die within a matter of days because the chemical balance on Earth will be nothing like what they're used to. Only one other planet has conditions at all similar to here, Mobius. Doctor Eggman is quite aware of the happenings here: I have been in correspondence with him. He warned me that anything that gets sent here which lives more than a few days is probably from Mobius, and that they would probably start acting very strange after a while. Unfortunately, his home was attacked at that precise moment and I haven't been able to contact him since."

Kurt looked concerned. "Why would he need to warn us about Mobian life?"

* * *

Sonic's brain was very tired. So many imbalances. Nerve impulses were sending strange information. Too much calcium? What to do…some adrenaline will do the trick until more information comes through. Nerve impulses say more. Norepinephrine production up. More cortisone. Too much, less. Run! Not enough selenium. Blood pressure too high: less adrenaline. Endocrine system overloaded. Nervous system giving conflicting signals. Paranoia setting in…other emotions blacked – number one priority is to escape. So tired. Time for sleep.


	16. More Confusing Plot Directions

Professor Oak looked thoughtful upon hearing Kurt's question. "To be honest, I'm not sure. I would imagine they will be acting very unpredictably and possibly violently, but I can't see how that's different to the wild Pokémon which already live here."

"That is, I think, the least of our worries," Giovanni said, "the main concern I have is that our little guild is found out about. I don't imagine the government would take kindly to us keeping this business of Transfers to ourselves."

"I don' know if they would take kindly to your…profession, either," said Kurt, somewhat disapprovingly, "What do you put on your income tax return under _occupation_? 'CEO of Evil Corporation'?

Giovanni opened his mouth to retaliate but Oak interrupted, "As much as I too despise Giovanni's way-of-life, he is right. If the government found out we were keeping this secret, my credibility would be destroyed. Kurt, your business in Pokéballs would be ruined, as would Sven's and Otis'! And think of the general public! See what's happened now the info on effort values has been leaked?"

The people around the table shuddered.

"If word of the Transfers was found out, the results could be far worse than people battling Caterpies non-stop to make tanks out of their Pokémon."

"The only person here who wouldn't be adversely affected by spilling the secret would be our friend Ivan," growled Giovanni, with a dirty scowl, "and a chain is only as strong as its weakest link."

Ivan looked terrified, but managed to squeak, "Hey, I found out by accident! It doesn't bother me that much…I don't even know all about it…I have a family to look after…please don't hurt me!"

Giovanni grunted and threw a piece of scrunched-up paper at him. Ivan let it bounce off his forehead and did not retaliate.

The man called Sven spoke, in a thick Scandinavian accent. "This is not time to be bickering. We must not give anybody reason to say secret to anyone."

Giovanni reached to scrunch another piece of paper, presumably for Sven's head, but paused.

"These are some of the initial plans I had when I was doing cloning experiments in my laboratory. Did anyone see that? They made a film about it."

Faces looked blank.

"Well, anyway, we tried to clone Mew using DNA fragments my assistants found in the Amazon rainforest. But it didn't matter what we tried, the clone never survived more than a few days. If I remember correctly, one of the head doctors hypothesized that it was because the sample did not contain a full set of Pokémon genes. It didn't occur to me at the time but that probably wasn't a Mew fossil, was it? It was just some dead Transfer."

"Lord knows, Giovanni. It could have been. Mew is merely mythical as far as we know anyway. Everyone who ever saw one could easily have imagined it, and none have ever been caught before."

"The thing is, eventually we found other samples in the area of what we thought were more Mew fragments. We put genes in and hoped for the best, we're talking odds like winning the jackpot in Celadon a hundred times in a row, and amazingly we got something that lived almost a month. Not comfortably though, the thing was more of a nervous wreck than anything I've seen before. The emotions kept swinging, it was like super fast bipolar."

Oak stroked his chin. "That is most interesting. If the genes of those new fragments were of a Mobian creature, then maybe that's what Dr. Eggman is trying to warn us about."

"He doesn't need to warn us, there's women on Earth. Doesn't get more emotionally charged than that!" joked Kurt.

There was general agreement, and someone mentioned something about 'can't get worse from where things are'.

"What should we do if we see a Transfer acting like this?" asked Ivan.

"I would definitely recommend walking quickly in the opposite direction to wherever it's going. Transfers could be violent if the emotion swings the right way, maybe. Can't be too careful…" Oak replied.

"Sounds like a plan," said Giovanni conclusively, "Now who wants a drink to wrap this up?"

* * *

Sonic woke with a start. Giving a startled cry, he sprinted away from his pursuer.

But there was no one.

* * *

"The last time I saw Sonic was before we went to get dinner," recounted Misty, worriedly.

"Why would he ditch us? And Tails too, aren't they supposed to be friends?" said Ash.

"It's weird, isn't it… do you think maybe something's up with his body like Tails' is?" suggested Richie.

"Maybe…neither of them knows how they got here from Mobius. Actually now you mention it, that makes a lot of sense! Trust you to think of that Rich!" Misty said.

He blushed at the compliment and looked around, averting eye contact.

"Hey, isn't that Gary?" he asked, pointing at the counter.

"Yeah, it is!" said Ash, irritably. "Oi, Gary! What are you doing here? Shouldn't you be out bullying some helpless novices in Viridian Forest?"

"Ash? For your information, it is _not_ bullying. Those idiots challenge me! I can't help it if my Arcanine has a type advantage over Metapod. So all I can say is fu-"

"Excuse me, sir," interrupted the Nurse, "would you be so kind as to finish telling me what is wrong with your Pokémon so I can do my job?"

"Yeah! I was battling a wild Pokémon last night and this blue flash thing ran into my Arcanine. The poor thing…he went flying! Arcanine, that is. Dunno what happened to the blue flash – it was gone when I looked around so I could destroy it."

Nurse Joy looked skeptical. "So you're saying a blue flash caused a large amount of physical harm to your Pokémon?"

Gary nodded, defensively.

"If you say so," she sighed, taking his Pokéballs and retreating to the ward.

"Gary! Come over here a second!" called Misty.

He paused on his way to the exit. "Why?"

"I want to ask you something."

Gary seemed surprised at being addressed in such a non-aggressive tone. Nonetheless, he sauntered over to where they were seated and waited impatiently for the question.

"That blue thing you said you saw last night…what were you doing when it came?"

"Being cooler than you. What does it matter?" he replied defiantly.

Misty rolled her eyes, as did most of the people listening. "Because our friend Tails was injured by your Arcanine last night, and Tails has a friend called Sonic, who is blue and can run fast. And we think both of them are sick."

"Oh. Well Tails was asking for trouble. That Pokémon was insolent to my face!"

"Tails isn't a Pokémon, we don't know what he is. But he's not a Pokémon."

"How are you so sure?" snapped Gary, still defiant.

Misty explained about the Pokédex and how the Professor had acted strange on the phone.

"Well, I don't know what you me to do about it. All that happened to me was that blue thing just sped past, like it was escaping from something. I dunno."

And with that, he walked off.

"At least he listened to the whole thing," noted Brock as Misty sighed.

"I suppose so, still, Gary can be infuriatingly unhelpful sometimes." she replied, deflated.

"Don't we know. I wouldn't worry bout it Misty." said Ash, giving her a quick squeeze. She smiled but said nothing, her thoughts elsewhere.

"I'm worried about Tails," she said, after a few moments, "I've become quite attached to him."

* * *

Doctor Eggman scratched his head.

"Where on Earth is everybody? I haven't been attacked in weeks! I've had enough time to build seventeen giant robots, but it's no fun if nobody wants to challenge me."

"This would be an almost perfect opportunity to sabotage the town!" cried Scratch, with delighted enthusiasm, "Without Sonic to meddle with your plans, you can rule all of Mobius! Ba-ha-ha-ha!"

"Shut up, you credulous cretin!" yelled the Doctor, "I must find the townsfolk and see where their hero has disappeared to. Perhaps there is a foe greater than I at hand here!"

Eggman made for town. When he arrived, he was disturbed to find everyone going about his or her business. He walked into a grocery store. It was void of customers, though not suspiciously so. On hearing the bell ringing as Eggman walked in, an aging rabbit appeared from behind a shelf. It took a second or two for the reaction of seeing the evil genius in his shop to kick in, but it did happen.

"Don't hurt me!" he stammered, running behind the counter, "I'll just open the till, please wait one second!"

"Get to it old man!" ordered Scratch. "We haven't got all day!"

"I told you to shut up, you bird-brain!" said Eggman, and kicked the robot square in the behind, right out the door. He shut it, to muffle the disgruntled squawks. "I don't want any money from you, today,"

The shop-owner looked extremely relieved. "Oh good! Well, how can I help you?" he asked, shakily.

"I want to know where Sonic is. Why hasn't he come to destroy my fortress recently?"

The shop-owner sighed, and reached under the counter, retrieving two pieces of paper.

"Both Sonic and Tails have been missing for the last few weeks now. There's signs posted all over Mobius but no one has seen them. Gone without a trace."

"WHAT?"

The rabbit cowered. "Nothing to do with me! We've been looking for weeks but they've disappeared! Please don't hurt me!"

Eggman wasn't listening; instead possibilities and ideas were churning over in his head. He briefly thanked the rabbit and left the shop, briskly heading back the way he had come.

* * *

Giovanni was just pouring himself his fourth glass of vintage rum when he heard a phone ring. Oak took a device out of his pocket, pressed a few buttons and the image of Doctor Eggman was projected onto the wall via the boat's entertainment system.

"Oak?" he panted, "I have something to tell you, important, about Transfers."

The Professor signaled for him to continue, though he knew it was a prerecorded message.

"I strongly suspect there may be two Mobians that have Transferred to Earth. Both of them mean well but could be extremely unstable if the chemical balance on Earth is even minutely unlike here. Just be on the lookout for a blue hedgehog or a fox with two tails. Both of them can speak. I'll be in touch."

The screen clicked off.

"I think everything that needed to be accomplished at this meeting has been," said Giovanni, impatiently, "now who wants a drink before they leave?"

* * *

Thanks for reading! I know that Scratch and Grounder were with Robotnik but I couldn't be bothered changing, and I really prefer those two. Not like there's any sort of canon to this story anymore anyway. Haha. Read and Review! 


	17. Ahhh, now it makes sense, or does it?

"Great idea, James!" cried Jessie, delightedly, as they scurried away from the police station, "You'd think an air vent would be harder to crawl through, especially in a prison. It's such a cliché they probably thought no one would even try it."

"No need to thank me," James replied, pleased, "now let's get somewhere safe."

They made heading for the Game Corner. When they arrived, the trio inconspicuously disappeared into the Team Rocket doorway in the wall, and took the lift down to the basement. The room was deserted, but well-maintained. There were long hallways leading in various directions. James looked around.

"Where will we go now? The twerps could be anywhere…" he sighed.

"Let's go back to the headquarters and start fresh from there," Jessie suggested, walking down a subterranean corridor. Meowth and James followed, in the absence of a better idea.

With the help of an electric cart they soon reached the Viridian Gym basement. Like the previous basement, it was also well-kept but devoid of activity. With the exception of the three the only movement was the flickering of a dying fluorescent light partway down the corridor.

"I don't like it down here," said James, in a small voice, "Let's go up and walk the rest of the way above ground."

Jessie rolled her eyes and pressed the lift call.

* * *

Sonic opened his eyes slowly. His head was throbbing, but he noticed his nerves had calmed and he was not hyperventilating. It was rather chilly, though…

"Ugh…where am I…" he groaned, glancing around, "Wha…Holy crap!"

Shelves lined the entire room, which was dimly lit a cool blue. The room was clearly refrigerated; that explained the temperature. But it was what was on the shelves that disturbed Sonic. Large glass jars filled with clear liquid, one after the other, from the floor to the ceiling. Inside them were horrible, twisted…things. Most resembled furless rodents, contorted and doubled over. Many were closer to malformed fetuses than animals. Every single one of them that Sonic could see in the dim light looked as though it had died in immense distress. Then, one of the jars caught his eye. In it, the distorted body of a Mobian fox.

He fainted.

* * *

"Jessie, are you excited? I'm excited! Yay! I can't wait. Oooh, I'm so excited!"

"Yes, James, I'm excited."

"How fortunate of us to come across that weird blue thing again! The boss will be delighted, I just know it!"

Jessie sighed. "James, settle down, before you hurt yourself,"

James took a deep breath. "Okay…I think I'm fine. Where did we put it?"

"Dunno, refrigeration room I think," Jessie shrugged.

"Oh, okay. Hey, is that the boss' car? Oooh, I'm so excited!" he squealed.

Meowth and Jessie sighed and followed James as he joyously bounded towards the car park. The boss' car. It was unmistakable; between two comparatively average executive sedans was parked a limousine that so defined decadent luxury it practically smelled of money. The chauffeur opened the rear door and Giovanni stepped out, looking content. When he saw James' delighted expression, his face fell.

"Sir, we have something amazing for you!" James cried.

Giovanni rubbed his eyes and sighed.

"What?" he grunted.

"We were just going about our business today see and anyway we found something lying on the ground and it's a rare Pokémon so we brought it here for you, can you please reward us?" James said, over about three seconds.

"Stop mumbling, you twit! What is it, stop wasting my time!"

James repeated himself slowly, though Giovanni didn't react as well as he would have liked.

"What?!" Giovanni asked, startled. "A rare Pokémon? Are you sure?"

"Yes," said James, gleefully, "I've never seen one like it before, it must be very rare."

"Oh Hell…wait - you brought it here?"

James nodded, slightly less enthusiastically. Giovanni's eyes widened.

"Where is it? Inside the building?" he asked, speaking quickly.

"Yes, sir, in that little cold room next to the laboratory. You know the one with the blue light."

"Oh, Lord."

Professor Oak was just taking off his coat at his house when the phone rang. He answered it.

"Hello?"

"Oak, it's Giovanni. We've got a little bit of a problem."

They spoke on the phone hurriedly and with a slight air of panic. After brief conversation, Oak hung up the phone, but his arm back through his coat, and went back to his car.

* * *

Deciding they needed to stretch their legs, the gang left the Pokémon Centre and headed back to the park behind their motel. Their Pokémon released and playing happily around a water feature, the trainers were able to relax slightly.

"I hope Tails is alright, it's been a few hours now and no word from the doctor," said Misty, glumly, sitting on a bench.

"He'll be right, Mist," said Richie, comfortingly, "the doctors know their stuff. Shouldn't be too much of a problem."

Meanwhile, Ash and Brock were busy discussing the Pokédex. The little device was being poked and prodded on every button with futile hope that it would somehow release more information about the error.

"I'm sick of this bloody thing," said Brock, defeated, "Oak made it completely inaccessible for the prying type."

Ash, who was now pointing the sensor at anything he could see that was moving, agreed.

"I just don't understand. What's so special about Tails that makes him different to a tree?"

He pointed the sensor at Pikachu and sighed when the Pokédex burst into life, giving information about his companion.

"This is really annoying - oh, yuck, Pidgeot, go and eat that somewhere else!" Ash said, recoiling slightly. The graceful bird had come to him holding what appeared to be a dead field mouse in her claws.

"Ash, she's just giving you a gift. It's a sign of affection that hunting Pokémon exhibit," Tracey told him.

Pidgeot cooed and dropped the carcass at his feet, then flew away to join the other Pokémon, who were playing a game with wild Magikarp in a nearby pond.

"It's disgusting," said a revolted Ash, "I can't even tell what it is."

"Pokédex it," Broke suggested. The result was quite a surprise.

"Look! It's that error again! The dodgy one!"

"What? Really?" came the astonished replies. Sure enough, the twisted, mangled body sitting in front of Ash was registering the same error that Tails had.

"That's it. Something weird is definitely going here. As soon as Tails is better we're going to Oak and we'll get the information out of him." Ash said, decisively.

"Um, Ash, uh, don't you think maybe it's better if we just forget about the whole thing? I mean, maybe we should just not meddle…" Tracey replied, with uncertainty.

**Meanwhile, as the group were discussing, over at the fishpond…**

"_Any luck thinking of a fantastic new strategy for telling the trainers about Tails?" _asked Sparky.

Unenthusiastic replies resounded.

"_Pardon us, but who is Tails?" _asked a Magikarp.

"_Oh, just a friend of ours," _said Pikachu, tersely. Wild Magikarp really didn't have any idea, did they…no social skills at all.

"_It's not that foxy thing is it?"_

Pikachu's ears pricked up. _"Yeah, it is. With two tails?"_

"_I know him! Well, actually, I don't, but one of my buddies does. We all saw him the other night fighting the big Arcanine. Crazy stuff. Anyway my buddy Huey says he was talking to a Pidgey who was taking a bath in here and anyhow this Pidgey said he'd seen this Tails thing a couple of weeks back in the middle of a woody grove somewhere. So anyways this Pidgey says to Huey that Tails must be what the fourth or fifth strange thing he's seen around, but the only one alive."_

The Pokémon blinked as they tried to make sense of the Magikarp.

"_Wait…what? There were other things like Tails, but dead?"_

"_I dunno! I only swim in this pond. That's just what I heard from Huey and that Pidgey that told him. Bye."_

And the fish swam off.

"_Ugh…wild Magikarp are just…the worst," _sighed Sparky, with a paw to the forehead.

"_Tell me about it!" _said Misty's Goldeen,_ "I had to share an ocean with those idiots until Misty caught me. Little wonder we bite on unbaited hooks, really."_

"_I think that's kinda strange, what the Pidgey said, though," _Pikachu spoke, _"maybe there IS loads of them about. How do we know?"_

* * *

Tails opened his eyes with a start. He sat up.

"Where am…oh, don't tell me I'm in a freaking hospital…"

"_Okay, I won't tell you," _came a voice from Tails' side.

He jumped, and saw a giant, pink blob wearing a cap staring delightedly in his face.

"_Oh, jeez, you startled me!" _Tails said to the Chansey.

"_Sorry," _replied the blob, somewhat unsympathetically, _"your scans have come through; the doctor's very busy trying to make sense of them at this very moment."_

Chansey indicated towards the door. It was closed, but Tails looked anyway. It opened, and the doctor hurried down the ward, scratching his head.

"Joy! Have you seen my pen? I put it down like five seconds – oh, right, resting Pokémon, sorry."

"_Doesn't his manner just reek of professionalism?" _sighed Chansey, with a sarcastic tone.

A pen flew through the open doorway at the other end of the room.

"_As soon as I can, I'm transferring myself outta here," _said the Chansey, _"I thought Vermillion was bad, this place is horrible."_

"_Right, but do you know why I'm here?"_

"_Well, you're sick."_

Tails sighed. _"In what way am I sick?"_

"_I'm not the doctor. When he knows, you will know."_

Deciding it was pointless to continue, Tails exhaled and sat back against his bed.

_I feel fine, _he thought to himself, _there is nothing wrong with me at all. Why am I even here? Where are my friends…this is just ridiculous, this entire thing-_

"_Will you please stop that!" _complained a Kadabra from somewhere in the room, _"For goodness' sake, you think so loudly!"_

"_Uh…sorry," _Tails whispered back.

"_Don't bother whispering;"_ said the Kadabra, irritably, _"I can hear what you're thinking anyway."_

Not sure how to go about thinking quietly, Tails simply shut his eyes and rested his head on the pillow. When he opened his eyes, his friends were by his bed and with the doctor.

"So you're saying there's nothing wrong with him?"

"Yep, the X-ray doesn't reveal any broken bones and the brain scan doesn't show any anomalous readings for a Pokémon of his size…although who knows, I've never come across his species before."

"What about the vomiting, and the gibberish…"

"Oh, probably just concussed from the knock on his head. A day's rest will cure that, I'm sure."

Tails sat up and opened his mouth to speak.

"Hey guys! Um, how's things?"

Something didn't feel right…he was thinking a lot harder about what he wanted to say.

"Tails! You're awake!" cried Misty, "We've been worried sick. Are you feeling alright?"

He scratched his head, racking his brain for the right word to use. "I'm…fine. Just a bit sore on the head, that's all."

"Will he be able to go today, doctor?"

"I think so, there's no real reason to keep him in the ward. But if there are any further problems, bring him to a Pokémon Centre straight away."

With that, handshakes and thanks were exchanged, Tails was freed from his sensor cables and the group proceeded out the door into the sunlight.

"Dodged a bullet there, eh, Tails," said Richie, with a nudge.

Once again, for some reason, he had to think for the answer.

"Heh, yeah. Lucky me." came his delayed reply.

"You feeling alright buddy? You don't seem yourself…"

Tails thought for about twenty seconds. "I can't…think what it is. Something isn't right but I'm not sure."

That wasn't the truth. Tails knew exactly what was wrong. He just didn't know how to say it.

"Well, when you work it, let us know, won't you?" said Misty, soothingly, "We're heading back to Pallet Town now, to Ash's home, to have a break for a week or so. Okay?"

Tails slowly absorbed what she had said and nodded.

"Good. Let's go to the coach stop, guys. I don't think one gets here for another twenty minutes yet but we can always let the Pokémon have a play in the meantime."

The group walked down the road to the coach station, which had a small green behind the ticket office. They released their Pokémon.

"Um…I need to…go for a quick walk," said Tails, tentatively. He followed the Pokémon as they bounded joyfully into the park, and when they were out of earshot, they spoke to him.

"_Tails, how you feeling, man?" _asked Pikachu.

"_I'm doing alright, but there's some weird stuff happening in my head. For a start, I can talk to you…but the guys think I'm rambling on like some sort of insane lunatic." _Tails replied.

"_Why don't you just tell them you're talking to us?"_

"_I…I can't. I dunno, since I fell, I've had to think really hard about what I want to say…and I can't explain anything anymore. Not in English, anyway."_

"_Gee, that's kind of a minor inconvenience," _said Squirtle, with just a hint of his ever-present sarcasm.

"_You're telling me…it's going to get very frustrating. By the way, what's Pallet Town?"_

"_Oh, that's where Ash lived before he left on his crazy journey," _said Pikachu, _"I still remember zapping the life out of him when we first met…"_

Pikachu drifted off into a nostalgic trance. Realizing he was not about to continue explaining, Sparky continued the conversation.

"_There's not much to do there, but you'll probably be wanting a rest anyway. Actually, Professor Oak lives in Pallet Town too; he might be able to figure out what's up with you."_

The Pokémon continued conversing about Pallet Town until they were called by their trainers.

"Come on Tails, time to go! The bus is here!"

"Coming," he replied, and climbed onto the coach.

* * *

"Having fun there, Misty?" teased Ash, as the bus chugged into a higher gear for the freeway.

"Oh, shush, you. Isn't he just adorable?" came her reply. Tails, who had taken a seat next to Misty, was now fast asleep and curled up in his tails, head resting on her lap, chest rising and falling peacefully.

"He's the cutest little thing I've ever seen!" she said delightedly, giving his body a gentle stroke, "I could sit like this all day and not get tired of it."

Ash shot an almost jealous glance at the dormant Tails, who was now snuggling tighter into his tail ball.

"Oh, stop it. He's a fox for a start, you idiot," said Misty, scornfully.

"So are you," was Ash's response, with a sly grin.

Misty rolled her eyes and smiled as Ash promptly received a barrage of abuse from his friends. She was smiling inside, too.

The coach soon passed the Mount Moon exit and was driving through Pewter City, then Viridian, then finally stopped in Pallet Town, with only Ash and his friends still aboard.

"Tails," said Misty, gentling rousing the fox awake, "Tails, we're here. Wake up."

He groaned softly and rolled over to see Misty looking straight into his eyes. He jumped and sat bolt upright, looking quite embarrassed.

"I wasn't sleeping on you for too long, was I?" he asked slowly, blushing.

"About two hours, you were out cold," replied Misty. "I don't mind, don't worry," she said, as Tails looked uncomfortably at the pink pressure marks on her thighs, "Anyway, we're here now, forget about it."

The group shuffled off the coach and stretching, they examined the surrounds. Pallet Town had stubbornly remained a small village, even with the rapid growth of other adjacent townships. Oak's Lab was the highlight of the town, perched high on a hill and overlooking the ocean, with other houses dotted here and there. Ash's house was a short walk down the main road; the front gate and mailbox were just visible around the bend.

They were just starting to cross the road when they heard an engine revving and tyres squealing. Looking to the source of the noise, they saw Oak's car skid out of his driveway and accelerate down the road.

"He's in a real hurry today…" said Ash, waiting for comment.

"Yeah, he's probably realized we're here and taken off," jested Brock.

"He probably has, actually!"

Ideas about where he was going brewed together but no conclusion had come about before they had reached Ash's home, a modest but nonetheless adequate farmhouse. Aromas of home-cooking wafted out of the kitchen window, typical of clichéd parent's homes in the countryside.

"Man, I'm starving! Come on in guys," said Ash.


	18. The South Pole

"So we've decided we need a bit of break," Ash finished explaining.

"That's okay hun," replied Delia, as she placed a bowl of roasted potatoes on the table. "It'll be nice to have you back for a bit."

After a very satisfying lunch, the group piled a large stack of dishes and then headed out into the sunshine to relax.

"What do we do about Oak then?" Richie provoked conversation.

"Yeah, who knows...he's acting real strange for my liking," mused Ash, "I guess- Richie, did your accent go away?"

Richie laughed. "There was never an accent, I was only in Australia for two weeks! It was just an experiment me and Brock decided to do to see if you guys would fall for it."

"Oh..."

"Yeah mate," added Brock, "no one in Orstralia actually speaks loik this,"

"Man, you guys are _hilarious_."

"Don't whinge! Just because you fell for it."

"Guys, can we get back on topic please?" sighed Misty. "Honestly, I feel like a primary school teacher when I'm around you guys. I want to find out what is the deal with Tails and all this gene radiation business."

"I suppose all we can do is wait until Oak comes back, that's if he does."

"Yeah...true. That's pretty frustrating..." conceded Misty.

Meanwhile, Tails racked his brains and searched for something...a word, what was it? It would explain everything – how annoying! That stupid fall...

* * *

Oak's car screeched up to the entrance of Giovanni's headquarters. He jumped out of his seat, threw his keys at a valet dressed in Team Rocket uniform, and hurried inside.

Now wondering whether he would ever see his car again, he glanced around nervously. Superficially this establishment looked entirely legitimate: secretaries typed away at information desks and a chorus of phone rings convinced the untrained observer that this was like any other business. But Oak knew better – he innocently pretended to look at the building directory, attracting little attention as he looked around for Giovanni.

There he was – a nervous face poking from behind an unmarked door. Oak walked over to him, and without exchanging words, followed him through the door, locking it behind him.

* * *

Sonic blurred into awakeness. He was still in the refrigerated room. Stretching, he walked up and down the shelves.

"What the..." he muttered to himself, looking into some of the jars, occasionally resisting the urge to gag. Some of these bodies were in better shape that others...deformed and broken. Especially disturbing to Sonic was the fox body – it was irrefutably a Mobian fox. But why was it here, and why was it dead, and why was floating in a jar on a shelf in a refrigerated room filled with other dead bodies?

He sat on the ground to think. His body felt very dull; not ready for sleep, just fatigued.

_Click._

What was that? Sonic's ears pricked up, and his heart started to race. He glanced around, trying to find some way out. There was one; the door. Light from outside streamed through the crack it formed as it opened slowly.

"Get back!" Sonic shouted.

The two men opening the door, and the figures behind them, jumped back with a fright, as did Sonic. As his eyes adjusted to the bright light, he saw a man in a suit, a few scientists and two scared looking juniors. The same ones that threw him into the ocean, incidentally.

There was an almost awkward silence as both parties stared at each other. Seeing the defensive posture of the humans, Sonic relaxed slightly.

"Okay...I know you realise that I'm going to ask this...but what the _fuck_ is going on inside this room?" he asked.

One of the men opened his mouth, and closed it, and opened it again, searching for a reasonable answer.

"Um, its a bit hard to explain..."

"Hard to explain? There must be hundreds of dead things in jars in here! What is hard to explain about that?"

The humans seemed lost for words, and very nervous.

"And yes, I'd also like to know where I am. Why aren't I in Celadon City with the rest of my friends?"

After a long pause, the man in the suit said hesitantly, "Umm, why dont you come into my office where it's more comfortable while we explain everything?"

_Do I trust them?_

After some brief pondering, Sonic agreed and followed the men cautiously down hallways and up stairwells. When they reached his office, a beatiful mahogany door, he stopped.

"This is it. Jessie and James: for some reason, you're still here. If you've found something interesting I may consider giving you a bonus but you can rest assured that if I can still see you by the time I've finished this sentence you won't be getting one."

It was all the convincing they needed, for they were out sight long before Giovanni unlocked the door and forwarded in. The room was dressed with very expensive-looking furniture – modern, unlike the the style of the door. Sunlight streamed through a large window and lit up the office: the floor and walls were immaculately white, and contrasted stylishly with the leather-adorned lounges, black with maroon trim. The entire outfit seemed to be taken from a magazine photograph.

"Have a seat," suggested Giovanni. Sonic hopped into a very right-angled leather recliner. He could sense a tension building within him, like he was about to sneeze.

"Jessie and James tell me they found you lying on the ground somewhere near here. How you got this far from Celadon City by yourself is beyond me, all I know is that you're here now. This is Professor Oak, Doctor Wallace and Doctor Yeung. They are researchers." Giovanni began explaining with the introduction. After a brief silence, Professor Oak realised Giovanni had finished speaking and continued quickly.

"Errr, I'm going to hazard a guess that you aren't from here?"

Sonic nodded, still disconcerted by something.

"Good, good. So, you just woke up and you were here?"

"Mmmm, yeah, but I touched a Power Ring first, it was glowing red, really strange like..." Sonic mused, more to himself than as a reply to Oak. This seemed to pique Giovanni's interest.

"Power ring?" he asked.

"Yeah, it went red and it was all warm, then I fell asleep and then I was here. Didn't feel a thing though."

"Yeung, is that like South Pole?"

The scientist, Chinese, frowned as he considered. "I don't know. It could be similar compound but seems to react opposite way. I have never seen Power Ring before, how do I know?"

Giovanni appeared unsatisfied with the answer but was faced with a good point.

"Right, out of my office, come with me to the lab."

Sonic was starting to feeling more and more nervous. Flashbacks of his strange dream flickered in and out of his vision as he went with the humans towards the laboratory. He soon recognised where they were, they were back where they started; he could see the room that he woke up in. He also noticed the slightly disgruntled expressions on the scientists' faces, having been led on a wild goose chase around the building.

By this stage Sonic was back to the way he had been before, his heart racing as he became convinced that someone was following him. He stopped to listen for the approaching predator.

"Is he okay?" asked Doctor Wallace, "His breathing is quite fast..."

The researchers turned and looked at Sonic, who was not in good shape. His pupils dilated, panting quickly and assuming a very alert posture, he looked quite aggressive. His breathing quickened still.

"Oak, is this him reacting with Earth?" asked Giovanni, with a very genuine tone of worry.

"I think so..." came the quiet reply.

"Oh jeez...get him to the Cold Room, quick!" Giovanni sacrificed his two researchers with an encouraging pat on the shoulders, nudging the terrified men towards the now very savage-looking Sonic.

The hedgehog jumped with a start, and somewhat-cornered by the two men, let his instinct take over. In a flurry of movement and noise, he curled up and spin-attacked. The men cried out in pain as blood splattered over their lab coats. Oak and Giovanni reluctantly came to the rescue: after a brief melee they managed to wrench open the door to the refrigerated room and tossed Sonic into it.

Panting, they looked around. A pot plant had smashed onto the ground in the scuffle and a water fountain was now leaking, forming a delicious muddy conconction in the corridor. Wallace and Yeung's lab coats were now glistening red, absorbing blood that was leaking freely from wounds in their forearms. There was silence, bar a clocking ticking somewhere down the hallway.

"I know what you're thinking, yes, you will be receiving hush money," said Giovanni casually, observing the horrified expressions on the doctor's faces. "Man, Eggman sure had a point didn't he?"

"Yeah," agreed Oak. "Now, why did you need me to come down?"

"Well, I needed your insight as to whether this was a rare Pokémon or a Transfer...but I think we know now."

Oak grunted in agreement.

"Wallace, how long till he stabilises?"

"Should be reasonable now sir," replied the man, grimacing as he nursed his arms.

"Good. Open the door then,"

Wallace gave Giovanni a look of utter disbelief, as though he had just suggested putting an ashtray on a motorcycle. Giovanni's expression seemed not to notice the scarlet-red labcoats resulting from the last time the door was opened, it simply insisted obedience.

Left with no choice, the doctor sighed and opened the door. Sonic, who was sitting on the ground, jumped at the movement and turned to them.

"Fuck you guys, seriously. What the hell..." he cursed, rubbing his head.

"If you'll bear with us for a little longer, we can explain properly," said Giovanni, "Unfortunately you don't seem to like the environment outside this room, so we'll have to discuss matters in a sterile area. If you can handle a short walk across the hall, perhaps we could talk in the lab where it's warmer?"

The three men standing with him raised their eyebrows at his unusual tact but said nothing, putting it down to very fast mood swings.

_I suppose I'm hardly going to stay in this room forever... and I hate going outside..._

"Alright then." Sonic agreed. He followed the men a short distance down the hall to another door – this one unmarked but adorned with an array of different locking mechanisms. Giovanni pressed his thumb against a pad on the door and it swung open.

The lab was deceptively large. Benches went around the entire room, with computer equipment installed in every imaginable place. Lit a cool blue, it was quite eerie, but most intriguing was a large perspex cylinder in the centre of the room. It was about three metres across, and extended from the floor to the ceiling. Inside, there was some sort of organic matter on the bottom of it and a small cube of a bright, gold metal hanging from the roof in the centre of the cylinder.

"Can I get anyone something to drink?" asked Giovanni.

"Some water would be nice, thanks," replied Oak. The doctors said nothing, probably realising Giovanni was not extending his generosity as far as his own employees. Giovanni pulled open a few cupboards looking for glasses. Various dubious scientific instruments spilled out as he rummaged, before he was hesitantly pointed towards the kitchenette at the other side of the room. Eventually, he managed to fill three glasses with water by prodding a touch screen built into the wall.

"Actually, I wouldn't drink this come to think of it," Giovanni said to Sonic, pouring his water down the drain, "There's minerals dissolved in this that you probably wouldn't agree with."

Sonic didn't care. He could sense something in this room. It had been a long while since he felt it – there were Power Rings somewhere here. Just what he needed. He concentrated hard and tried to detect the source of the sensation, a feeling that warmed from the inside. Suddenly, there was a blinding flash of light, accompanied by a muffled, yet horrible screech. When Sonic's eyesight returned, he saw a grotesque thing thrashing about inside the cylinder. It was grey and scaly, about the size and shape of a rabbit. It rolled around in apparent agony, clawing at its face as though it was burning. It screamed and cried and, still clawing, bashed against the walls of the cylinder in a desperate attempt to escape. It did this several times before collapsing on the ground, silent.

There was about five seconds of nothing, then Professor Oak dropped his glass, the smash breaking the silence. His expression was genuinely disturbed. He opened his mouth and made a sound but no words came out.

"If you're wondering Oak, that was a Transfer. That container there contains South Pole, a compound which seems to attract Transfers off the Wave. Dunno why. The setup we have there focuses the Wave and its harmonics onto the South Pole and the cylinder is basically a concentrated Earth. Harmless to anything native here but anything that won't survive from anywhere else dies or falls asleep within thirty seconds. After they die we put them in the cold room until we have time to study them a bit more." Giovanni casually explained, while his unpertubed researchers went about prodding touchscreens and writing logs in various books.

"Christ Giovanni, I knew you had an underground operation happening here but this is just...unbelievable."

"Oh shut up, don't try and pretend your 'breeding' farm is so innocent."

"Breeding farm is one thing, I mean we need fresh supplies of starters every time someone turns ten, but this is wrong on so many levels. I will honestly go home and cry myself to sleep for the next month after seeing that show."

"Awww, poor thing. Does someone need a cuddle?"

Sonic stopped listening and watched Doctor Wallace. The presence of Power Rings was stronger now. The man had a large pair of tongs and a jarful of what appeared to be ether. He walked over to the cylinder and somehow found a way to open the wall. A door swung open and he went inside, picked up the creature, and deposited it into the jar. The perspex of the door was at least three inches thick; the animal must have been screaming fairly loud. Sonic now knew what was attracting him, the South Pole. Something clicked in his head and he knew that was what he needed to grab.

Unfortunately, Doctor Wallace had already swung the door closed and sealed the tube.

"Hey, can I see that South Pole thing?" Sonic asked Giovanni.

"Can't you see it from here?" came a sardonic reply.

"Yes, obviously," replied Sonic, returning the sarcasm, "I want to touch it,"

"Be my guest,"

In a second, Sonic was ready at the door where Wallace had got inside the cylinder, anxious to handle the cube of golden goodness and satisfy the intense craving his body was having.

"By the way," Giovanni added as an afterthought, "considering you had a pretty aggressive reaction from sitting in my office just before, I'm almost completely certain that if you go into that room you will you be in terrible agonizing pain for the brief moments that you remain alive."

Sonic's face fell. "Really?"

Oak agreed. "Yes, chances are you'll go beserk if you go in there. You already have abnormal mineral levels in your body so you would be dead within seconds of being inside. Though I suppose that's a good thing by the looks of it."

"For goodness' sake, will you stop whinging about the Transfers, Oak!" exclaimed Giovanni impatiently, "The only difference between what happens in that room and what happens outside is that they die quicker in here. It is technically the most humane way of going about it. And not all of them die you know,"

Oak ignored the scolding but was interested by this development. "How many have survived?"

"Well, only one so far. A fox thing. It was interesting, most Transfers make a big fuss and then die but this one...she just looked confused and tried to get the attention of the doctors. Very exciting really. She did eventually die a couple of days later but I don't think it was because of the environment here."

Sonic was also very interested by this point. "Keep going..."

"Well that's it really, I think she died from mental stresses. She was crying most of the time, she had just given birth to a baby which was now orphaned, that probably did it. I'm not one for feeling emotion but I'll admit I felt a bit sorry for the fox, probably because it could talk. I think she went a bit mad in the end, she kept saying she could see things that weren't there..."

Sonic couldn't believe it...Tails' mother? He would have to tell him about this as soon as he saw him again. But more pressing matters...that South Pole.

"So, can I touch that South Pole then?" he asked, abruptly changing the subject.

"If you really want to die I can offer you less painful methods," suggested Giovanni.

"Great, but can you answer my question?"

He sighed. "If we take it off the hanging thing it'll take ages to put back, it's been calibrated precisely to the foci of ellipsical dishes integrated into this building you know."

"Actually," corrected Doctor Yeung, "It's just hung on piece of string, it wouldn't be hard to put back on."

Giovanni visibly resisted getting very angry. "Fine, you may hold it for a minute," he said, pumping his fists and breathing deeply.

Yeung went inside the cylinder and removed the South Pole. It was an orange-gold cube, shiny and metallic. Sonic was mesmerised by it. His heart rate quickened as he reached out to look at it.

He took it in his hands, it was light and very warm. He relaxed his body.

Then in a flash, he was gone.

"Oooh, yay." came the unexcited response from Giovanni, as the South Pole clattered on the floor, "Sorry to drag you out for all that Samuel, I did hope you'd learn something but I guess not."

"Meh, at least now I know I never want to come back in here again. You really are a criminal, you know that?" said Professor Oak as he turned to leave.

"What did you expect to see, a toy factory?"

"Point taken I suppose," Oak chuckled, and left, shaking his head.


	19. Tails' Parameters

The troupe of Pokémon trainers made their way back down the main street towards where the black, rubbery scars of Professor Oak's car joined the road with his driveway.

"I'm telling you again and again guys, this isn't the right way to go about it," sighed Misty, exasperated, "I'm doubting whether Professor Oak is going to be in the mood to see to our petty demands for information when he comes back anyway."

"And I'm telling you again Misty, you were the one who whinged first about wanting to know about the gene business, remember? Or did you forget about that since the last time I reminded you like, thirty seconds ago?" replied Ash, with a weary sarcasm.

Richie glanced at Brock and symbolically placed his hands over his ears, with an accompanying eye-roll.

"I didn't mean go straight to his lab and wait for him to come back! He's going to get the worst 'those meddling kids' impression of us when he comes back to find a bunch of teenagers sitting on a log outside his front door with nothing else better to do in the world than tackle a nice mystery," came Misty's equally acerbic reply.

"So what? I _also _just want to know what could be wrong with Tails. We're not all primarily concerned with what the Professor thinks of us, you know."

"Screw you, you ass!"

"Seriously guys!" cried Brock, with a palm to forehead, "you bicker so much!"

At the very least, the verbal component of their argument ceased and the group walked in semi-tense silence to the top of Oak's long driveway. He had certainly chosen to utilise his great wealth and his laboratory, though not obscene, was large relative to the other homes in Pallet and the view from his porch extraordinary. The clear day revealed just the tip of Cinnabar Island to the south, and the surrounding plains with astonishing clarity. Many minutes passed as the group forgot their quarrels and gazed into the distance, pointing out the odd landmark or wild Pokémon. Only the sound of Oak's car pulling into the drive distracted them.

Oak stepped out of his car. "Well, hello there guys, what a pleasant surprise!" he said, with a valiant attempt at a genuine smile.

"Hi, Professor," came the motley replies.

"We still weren't sure about what the Pokédex said before, so we thought you'd come and take a look yourself, if you have a moment." said Ash, explaining their presence.

"Oh, and maybe you could have a look at our friend Tails. He hasn't been very well lately and Pokémon Centres haven't known what to do." added Misty, shooting her filthiest possible look at Ash for not mentioning it.

Oak blinked several times before welcoming them in. For once, the lab was very clean. Benches and tables usually piled high with loose papers were now bare, save for the odd newspaper or coffee cup.

"You picked a good time to visit," remarked Oak, "now that the university semester has finished I'm not always marking assignments and I have had some spare time recently. I think your Pokédex issues may be related to your friend Tails, Ash, so I'll have a look at it first."

"Him," corrected Tails, "I'm a him."

The Professor raised his eyebrows. "A talking Pokémon? You guys certainly found yourself a gem. Well, Tails, why don't you have a seat in my lab and tell me what the problem is, and I can maybe run a few tests to see if I can help you out."

The fox shrugged and followed the man into the adjacent room. The trainers moved to follow, but Oak turned. "For the moment, it's probably best that you wait out here. Help yourself to tea and coffee, and I think your mother left a wonderful cake in the fridge while I was out, Ash. Bless her, surprising me with something like that..." His voice tapered off and he snapped back to a professional focus, leaving the teenagers in the kitchen.

Tails looked around the laboratory room. It was clinical, as one would expect, but it was illuminated by natural light and thus lacked the coldness which the Pokémon Centre offered and he felt far more at ease.

"First of all Tails, are you able to tell me what the matter is?" asked Oak, taking a chair and a notepad and inviting Tails to follow suit.

Tails took a breath. _Please, brain, let me speak!_

"Well, maybe. I hit my head a few days ago, and ever since it's been quite hard for me to talk to people."

"Yes, that's understandable, now, how did you hit your head?" replied Oak, gently, while scribbling furiously. So Tails slowly recounted the story of Gary's Arcanine battling him, and Sonic pushing the dog out of his path just he was about to dive-bomb it.

"Can I stop you there for a moment, Tails? What I would like to know is, who taught you how to talk?"

"Ummm...I've always known, as long as I can remember. Back on Mobius everyone spoke English."

Oak stopped writing and looked up quickly, eyes wide. "M-Mobius?"

"Oh, yeah. That's where I used to live before I was somehow transported here." Tails gratefully thanked his brain for allowing him to enunciate that piece of information.

"Okay Tails...do you mind if I do a few tests now? They won't hurt."

Tails agreed and Oak cautiously wheeled Tails' chair to a part of lab equipment covered in screens and buttons. Oak rummaged through various drawers and pulled out brain electrodes like the ones Tails wore at the Pokémon Centre. He carefully applied them to parts of Tails' body, as though he were a fragile bomb which would explode if he were prodded too forcefully. He then attached them to terminals on the lab equipment and started calibrating and applying settings, twisting knobs, flicking switches. Finally, he pressed a large green circle and the screens filled with letters and numbers. He pressed another button and a scroll of information printed out of the computer. Oak tore it off and looked through it with ferocity, occasionally glancing at Tails from head to toe, as though checking calculations. He occasionally muttered to himself and made a note with his pencil, which was now considerably shorter than when it had started. Oak sighed, relieved, and was considerably less nervous than he had just appeared.

"Tails...did you happen to know a blue hedgehog in all your travels?"

"Yes, I did, Sonic. He was from Mobius too."

"I've met him. I don't want to make you panic, but he's not Earth anymore. I believe he was transported away from here in the same way that both of you got here in the first place. I suppose you want to know about that, too? A few people strongly involved with Pokémon here on Earth have observed a strange phenomenon that occurs once every ten or fifteen years. Certain creatures appear randomly on Earth, with alarming frequency. Generally, the composition of Earth's soil is too different to what they are used to and they die very quickly due to internal chemical imbalance. Actually, that always happens. You and Sonic are the first Transfers, as we call them, to ever survive more than a day in Earth's environment.

"Anyway, what is particularly curious about you is that you have been almost unaffected by Earth. Sonic, as we expected, eventually started disagreeing with the environment and his body started to degenerate. He lasted some time, though, which suggests that Mobian creatures may have a similar tolerances for the minerals found in our soil. Now, next point in case is Pokémon DNA. It is a very miraculous thing indeed. It is unlike anything which can be replicated in our labs. Pokémon DNA is remarkably fluid and can adapt quickly. Sometimes it changes spontaneously, like a chemical reaction. That is why some Pokémon evolve.

"This readout basically summarises all the features of your DNA, they're your parameters, if you will. Were you a known Pokémon it could tell me what 'level' you were at, what attacks you can or have used, how frequently you used them, the types of Pokémon you battled, whether you had been inside a Pokéball, all sorts of information. The fluidity of Pokémon DNA allows all of that information to be stored in your body. I use a compact version of this machine in the Pokédex, which is a device trainers like Ash use to determine basic information about a Pokémon. There is much more to it than that, I still discover more about it every day, but what I'm trying to say is, this machine has given me a readout of all your DNA, as you can see."

Oak showed the paper to Tails, who looked at it. Indecipherable, it looked like computer code. The Professor had highlighted certain sections of the text.

"Those highlighted bits are parts of your DNA which I haven't seen before, I'm thinking they are very specific to Mobian life. But most of the rest of it I have seen before, in other Pokémon that I have studied. This leads me to believe that you are a hybrid Pokémon, Tails."

The poor fox's head was spinning. Tails was intelligent, and he understood every word the Professor said, but it was still a shock.

"...a hybrid Pokémon?"

"Yes. You have features of a Pokémon, but you aren't completely one."

Oak fed the paper back into the machine, pressed a few buttons and a new readout came out of the printer.

"This," he said, showing it to Tails, "is telling me all the parts of your DNA that have changed and adapted since the last time I printed it out. You are very unique, Tails. Your DNA adapts quickly, very quickly, and in this new environment, parts of your Mobian DNA have changed and become more suited to living in this world. It's adapting right now, although you won't be able to tell. I believe that you will appear physically identical regardless of your environment, only the stuff underneath is changing. That is how it is for Pokémon - they all look the same from birth despite having different attacks and backgrounds."

"So...I'm turning into a Pokémon?"

"You could be. Parts of your DNA haven't changed at all. That's why you're unique. For instance, I don't think you have the parts of DNA required to be captured by a Pokéball. It's very fascinating. I would love to spend the rest of my life studying you as it would provide countless advancements in our knowledge of Pokémon, but...of course I can't..."

Oak took a step closer to Tails, staring at him with a hungry, slightly crazed expression.

"I can't do any of that. The information about Transfers is totally confidential. You aren't allowed to know about it, but now you do..." Oak took another step closer to Tails, now deadly serious, "so now, I have to kill you, to make sure none of this information ever gets out."

Tails eyes widened. "Really?"

Oak chuckled. "Of course not. I just like to do that from time to time. I'm serious about the secrecy though, I'm not allowed to tell Ash or anyone why you're acting up, you can tell them yourself if you want though."

Tails sighed with relief. "Oh, but I can't. Every time I try and a speak about it I lock up and can't talk. I guess that explains why I can speak to Pokémon though..."

"That must be a pain," said Oak sympathetically, "but try and work something out. I'll tell them you aren't sick, but I can't say much more. Unfortunately I can't predict any more than anyone else what will end up happening to you, although you might find yourself able to do all sorts of tricks sooner or later."

The Professor winked at Tails and they left the lab for a cup of tea.


	20. Rosie

"So there's nothing suspicious about Oak at all?" asked Ash, with a slight air of disbelief as the group strolled down Pallet Town road. The street seemed at its busiest – at least three or four cars must have passed them since they had left the lab ten minutes earlier.

"Mmm...not really, nothing as sinister as you were probably thinking," replied Tails, "he explained everything to me but it's secret so he can't tell you. And my head would hurt if I tried to repeat what he said. It's okay though, we worked out why it hurts, so there's nothing wrong with me."

"That's good to know," soothed Misty, "we'll just have to get used to it, I suppose."

The trainers meandered across a meadow behind the cluster of houses that was the heart of Pallet Town. A gentle breeze nudged the odd puff of cloud through the sky and sent ripples across the unkempt grassland. Misty was the first to stop and lie down, but her actions quickly inspired the others to do the same.

"Oh wow, best resting about to happen right now," she sighed contentedly, lazily flopping into a tuft of soft, thick grass. "I think there's a stream nearby... I'll let my Pokémon have a play while I have a quick nap."

The other trainers muttered in agreement and released their Pokémon as well.

"Well, I'll go for a walk with the Pokémon then," Tails suggested, "I need the fresh air."

The fox bounded away with the other Pokémon until they met up with Misty's, who had been released into a gentle stream about fifty metres away.

"_So, you talked with the '_Pokémon Prof._'?_" asked Pikachu, with some amusement.

"_Yeah, apparently I'm part Pokémon now. Weird, huh?_"

The Pokémon cooed in wonder.

"_How can you be part Pokémon?_" asked Squirtle.

"_Haven't a clue. Although that's probably why I'm able to talk to you guys all of a sudden, I swear I wasn't able to when I first came here,"_

Tails and the Pokémon continued to chat casually about the predicament. Then the fox saw something out of the corner of his eye - a little flash. He looked around to see where it came from.

"_What is it, Tails?" _asked Pikachu.

"_Didn't you see that little sparkly thing just then?"_

"_...nope." _came the replies, sounding definite.

Tails looked back. There was a willow draped over the banks of the creek. He looked at it more closely. There! – there was a Pokémon hiding in it. A tiniest glimpse of pink was poking out from behind the gnarled trunk.

"_Can't you see that, in the tree across the river?"_

"_Tails, it's a tree. There's nothing there. Except maybe a Pidgey, and trust me, don't even go there."_

Too late though. The little fox's curiosity overwhelmed him, and he flew across the stream to investigate. He looked up and saw the rest of the Pokémon. A dainty pink cat, with a long tail, just sitting on the branch. It watched Tails warily as he moved under the branch to look straight up at it.

"_Um, hi?"_ Tails said.

The cat's eyes momentarily widened in surprise, but it remained silent and motionless.

"_Hello? Can you talk?" _Tails greeted again.

"_Who...who is that?" _asked the cat, cautiously. A young, female voice. "_Have you used Transform?"_

"_No..._" replied Tails, raising an eyebrow.

"_Well, then how come you can see me!?" _retorted the Pokémon, indignantly.

"_You're...right there?" _suggested Tails, bewildered.

"_I'm not, I'm invisible! I'm sure I am..."_

* * *

"_Well, Tails is freaking out." _concluded Squirtle, watching him from the other side of the stream. "_Who is he talking to?"_

"_I have no idea - there's no-one there," _answered Pikachu. "_Maybe he is going mad... but he seems so normal, and Oak said...it's really weird. I don't like it!"_

* * *

"_Okay then, mister," _the little pink cat mused, "_who is it? Is that you playing tricks on me again, Mickey?"_

"_No, I'm Tails. And there's no tricks, I don't know how to Transform." _the fox replied, ever more confused.

"_You're lying!"_ accused the Pokémon, slightly irritated. "_Only Mews can see other Mews when they're invisible! And I know I'm invisible, see?"_

The Mew rose off the branch, flew across the river and hovered in front of Pikachu and Squirtle, who did not change their concerned-bewildered expressions despite the feline positioned directly in their line of sight. She returned with an air of satisfaction at having logically defeated Tails' prank.

"_Well, I'm not a Mew, but I can definitely see you. What's your name?"_

The Mew looked at Tails, floating up and down slightly as she weighed him up.

"_Rosie." _she replied, after some thought. "_How come you can see me?" _The question was abrupt and still somewhat accusatory.

"_I have no idea, but I'm not from around here anyway. So maybe it's only regular Pokémon and humans who can't see you."_

"_What do you mean _regular _Pokémon!? You're crazy!" _concluded Rosie.

"_Well, I doubt you'd believe me if I told you anyway, so why don't you just pretend I'm a Mew if it makes you happy,"_

"_I'd rather not. I'm so tired of being a Mew, I really wish I could just go and hang with those Pokémon there rather than stay invisible every time I need time away from the colony."_

Feeling now compelled to satiate the cat, Tails insisted that she join him with the others.

"_No way, I can't. I mean...I'd love to, more than anything, but if anyone finds out I'm even talking to not-a-Mew I'm going to get my tail kicked when I get home, if you'll pardon my French."_

"_Please? Those Pokémon are my friends and all they can see right now is me talking to thin air...they're going think I'm absolutely nuts."_

"_Ah, but Tails," _Rosie replied, with a flitting smile, _"that's what you're meant to think."_

There was a brief silence.

"_Okay, usually I go invisible now and leave the person I just accidentally talked to confused and doubting their sanity...but I just remembered that I am invisible."_ said Rosie, sheepishly._ "Are you _positive_ you aren't a Mew?"_

"_Yes!" _sighed Tails, "_Please just come over to my friends for a quick second, or they're going to think I'm really weird."_

Rosie looked Tails in the eye. It was then that he noticed them for the first time: a sparkling blue that seemed to gleam with youth and energy; a well infinitely deep to peer into, shrouding her thoughts beneath sapphire-crystal irises.

"_Tails," _Rosie interrupted, "_Generally speaking, it is considered polite to listen to people you just asked a favour of when they're talking to you,"_

"_Sorry," _apologised Tails, hurriedly. He hoped with fervency that she did not notice him caught in her eyes; they were just...so captivating.

"_As I was just saying,"_ the Mew repeated, with the slightest roll of the eyes, _"I'll come over with you, but I'll only appear if I'm satisfied that no one can ever find out I did. Except the Pokémon who see, obviously."_

"_Thank you so much!" _said Tails, gratefully.

"_You're lucky I like the look of you. Otherwise you'd really be stuck!" _she giggled, _"Come on then, I want to get out of here before anyone at home notices I've been gone a while._"

* * *

"_Look out, he's coming back over," _observed Squirtle, _"we should all probably stop staring at him like he's an axe murderer now."_

The Pokémon awkwardly averted their eyes at the closest insignificant objects.

"_Hey, guys...just so you know, I know what you're thinking – I'm not insane," _reassured Tails to his unconvinced friends, "_there was a Pokémon in the tree that could turn invisible."_

"_An invisible Pokémon that only you can see?" _asked Pikachu, dubiously.

"_I know it's a bit hard to believe, but yes. Her name is Rosie, she's a Mew,"_

The Pokémon raised their eyebrows further.

"_Tails, Mew are just legendary Pokémon. No one has ever seen one."_

"_Well, I did. She said she'd come over and reveal herself if you guys promise that you won't tell anyone that you saw her."_

"_Tails, this is all very hard to believe. Are you sure you aren't imagining things? You haven't been feeling your best..."_ Pikachu tenderly suggested.

"_No, she's next to me. Come on Rosie, show yourself to them!" _Tails insisted.

"_I can't. I think there's someone watching._" Tails heard Rosie's voice inside his head. The others' unchanged facial expressions indicated that he was communicating telepathically.

"_Please! I promise nothing will happen! They think I'm crazy."_

* * *

"James! Look! Next to the fox! It just made a Mew appear! Is that a Mew?!" cried Jessie.

"Then give me the binoculars!" groaned the irritated James, "you've been looking through them for ages now anyway."

Far off in the distance, Team Rocket spied upon Ash's free Pokémon from behind the fence around Professor Oak's farm. From a small mound they had enough height to make out the group of Pokémon by the stream, all staring excitedly at the Mew.

"Holy moly, you're right! I think that is a Mew! How could that be? They are only supposed to be a legend!" James zealously exclaimed.

"It was the fox - Tails!" announced Jessie, "Tails made it show, look at it again!"

James peered into the binoculars.

"...it's...it's gone." he cooed.

"No matter," Meowth dismissed, "we'll just have to get dat fox if we want da Mew. But imagine what Giovanni would say if we brought one to him..."

"It would be like if..." James hypothesised, "...if this meadow was all ours to own, but instead of grass it was twenty-dollar notes,"

"Or fifty-dollar notes," Jessie added, eyes gleaming, "Screw Pikachu, it feels like we've been chasing that stupid little rat for over ten years now! Our new objective is Tails!"


	21. Chapter 21

"_Well, I have to say - Tails, you had us thinking..."_ conceded Squirtle, _"but wow – a real Mew! I was always a skeptic of that whole legend...and they aren't bad looking in real life __either."_

Tails smiled to himself as he observed Rosie eavesdropping beside the group, invisible. She giggled.

"_I sensed that I was being watched so I had to disappear – I _told_ you it wasn't safe! I'm always right." _

Tails was unsure whether she was at all concerned that she might have been seen. She certainly didn't seem it; her gleeful expression as she wafted about the group in the breeze was purely one of careless relaxation.

"_Come on Rosie, I should probably take you somewhere safer."_

As they made their way back to the willow tree, Tails watched Rosie as she floated about. She was shorter than he was, with a body less than half a metre tall, but she had a long, slender tail that flowed far above her petite stature. Her fur was the strangest hue and very fine - white by any casual glance, but on closer inspection, just a faint pink that seemed almost luminescent. And then there were her shimmering blue eyes that seemed to consume anybody who caught their gaze...

"_Whatcha thinking about, Tailsy-Tails?" _ an upside-down Rosie interrupted, suddenly in the fox's face, "_Not me again is it?"_

She laughed and grinned playfully, biting her lip as she twirled around above him.

"_You wish_," Tails laughed back.

"_Don't start__, fox, __Mews are psychic - __I can read your thoughts!"_ came Rosie's dismissive answer, as she grinned ever widely. Tails' heart froze. Mortified, and feeling himself starting to blush, he struggled to think of something to say to this revelation.

"_You're so full of crap!" _he teased, defensively.

"_Wanna bet? You couldn't _stop_ thinking about how pretty I am,"_

Tails sighed, hoping to find a bottomless pit that he could disappear into. "_I sup__pose not..."_

"_That's too bad," _Rosie chuckled, "_I _am _full of crap. I can't read your thoughts at all."_

"_Oh__-__" _Tails exclaimed, feeling even more embarrassed than before, "_you're _so_ dead!"_

He twisted his tails and flew racing after Rosie, who, sensing imminent retaliation, had fled laughing. Together they shot into the air, until Pallet Town's houses and shops were like miniatures in a museum exhibition. He stayed behind her, ghosting her every move and staying out of eyeshot. High above the lush meadows below, she paused in the cool breeze, looking for Tails as he approached her silently from behind before smacking her lightly around the head.

"_There, that's what you get._"

"_Hehe, I suppose," _she agreed, biting her lip again, "_thanks for the compliment though."_

"_What?"_

"_Even if I ca__n't read minds, I'm pretty sure I knew what you were thinking anyway. You were blushing." _Rosie beamed at Tails.

At this point, Tails was ready to implode under the mass of his own embarrassment. "_So what?" _he asked, defensively.

The cat giggled again. "_So, I'm always right." _Rosie glanced at Tails, who sheepishly averted eye-contact and was again blushing furiously. _"It's okay though, I think you're pretty cute too." _She added.

"_I suppose you are always right then," _joked Tails, trying to hide his satisfaction.

There was a semi-awkward silence; having confessed a mutual attraction, the pair suddenly became aware that they were alone in a totally secluded area. A few moments passed before Tails hastily thought of something to say.

"_So Rosie, you said something before about a colony? Do you live with other Mews?"_

"_Oh... yes. I live__d__ in a group of about, I dunno, thirty other Mews. As far as I know it's just us left. Most of us were hunted basically to extinction years ago for our delightfully soft fur." _she explained cheerfully. _"Anyway, I'm the youngest in the group and when the elder Mew died recently there was all th__is__ pressure on me to find a mate and keep the colony going... I'm sure you can figure the rest out."_

"_You ran away. Same here."_

"_No kidding!" _Rosie paused, her smile fading. _"Do you __ever __get... homesick?"_

Tails considered it. _"I __suppose so, now that I think about it. Do you?"_

Rosie's expression saddened. _"Like you wouldn't believe. I would be back there now if I wasn't totally lost... I left in a rage and I wasn't thinking and I Teleported and it's gone to shit and now I'm not sure if I'll ever see any of them again."_

Tails couldn't help but notice her eyes beginning to well up.

"_Not just that, but it's strict law in the colony that we never reveal ourselves to anyone other than another Mew... you're the first person I've talked to in weeks! It's been so awful. I've never felt so lonely ever."_

She sniffed recognising the situation Tails proffered his arms for a mid-air hug. Rosie gratefully accepted the gesture and returned a tearful smile.

"_Thanks. I should be embarrassed... you barely even know me... but I'm craving company that much – this is so comforting."_

"_You're telling me! Your fur is divine!"_Tails responded, as lightheartedly as he could.

She managed a laugh, wiping her eyes and smiling at him. _"Well... __as far as I'm concerned..__.__ you're welcome to it any time you want.__"_

* * *

**There you go, faithful readers. I normally put this notice at the top but I didn't want to spoil the story for you (lol). Anyway, I had officially given up on writing this; the last update was over a year ago and the story itself is woefully twisted from a lack of plot direction combined with my generally inadequate writing ability in earlier years. Plus I'm at university now and I just don't have time to fix it up, as much as I would like to. Short of co-writing it with someone else I just don't see how I could manage it!**

**Anyway, I was trawling my old documents the other day and found this fragment of the next chapter in progress. I finished it off, with a pretty unsatisfying (possibly temporary) wrap-up line, just to satisfy you guys. But I'll be honest, I don't think I'll have the energy to start a new chapter. Thanks so much for reading and I hope you enjoyed reading my chapters as much as I enjoyed writing them. For now, the redo is finished. If I ever have time to write again it will be a Redo of the Redo anyway!  
**


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